


Artistic Company

by Markov_Debris



Series: Company Series [21]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Episode: Audio Drama: Lost Souls, Episode: s02e13 Exit Wounds, Episode: s04e12 The Stolen Earth, Future Character Death, M/M, Post-Episode: s02e13 Exit Wounds, Post-Episode: s04e13 Journey's End, Spoilers for Series, Torchwood Novel: Almost Perfect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-18
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-03 21:01:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 29
Words: 37,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12756126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Markov_Debris/pseuds/Markov_Debris
Summary: The last three member of the Torchwood Team are rebuilding their lives in the wake of Gray’s attack when Jack makes an unusual request of Ianto.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is the last story in my Company Series (though not in the Awaiting Universe) and I will be splitting this story into two because the Epilogue for Company of a Stranger and Company of a Ghost is set just before the end of this story and directly effects the events in the Epilogue chapters. There may be mention of events in the rest of my Company Series but you don’t have to have read then to enjoy this story, though you might find reading the Epilogue of Company of a Stranger and Ghost helpful. I have created an Artistic Company Series so that you can just read this story without the Epilogue from Company of a Stranger and Ghost.
> 
> I also know nothing about art beyond what I learnt at school and a few thing picked up from documentaries and museums, but I can write the images in my head. Some chapters will also have names. It is unbeta’d so please forgive any mistakes and all comments are very welcome.

It was while locked in a cell with an unconscious Weevil, after Gray had come by to look at them, that Ianto knew his life in Torchwood had changed forever.

Jack was buried somewhere under Cardiff for nearly two thousand years.  He had no idea what affect that would have on his mind, only that it couldn’t be good, especially as the one to bury him was a beloved brother.

It made him wary of approaching Jack when he was let out of his cell, despite Gwen throwing herself at him.  The Ex-PC he knew needed the physical contact to reassure herself that Jack was alive, needed his strength to draw comfort from.

When Jack held a hand out to him, Ianto went to him without hesitation.  The Immortal too needed physical contact and comfort and the Welshman was glad he was still the one they were drawn from.

As Jack told Hart that Gray had been taken care of, Ianto felt relief flood him.  He had seen the insane madness in the man’s eyes, knew he was dangerous, knew that if Jack or one of the others hadn’t rescued them, then being killed by the Weevil would have been the kinder fate.

Ianto knew that the Immortal had been incapable of killing his brother before he was buried.  He knew as well as Hart that Jack hadn’t killed him now, given what had happened to him, that was a good sign.

The relief and joy of Jack’s return didn’t last.  He heard the desperate cry of anguish, witnessed Toshiko Sato’s dying moments and felt a part of himself die with her.

He left Gwen and Jack to mourn, there was still work to be done.  He ordered Hart out to the hospital to either collect the Hoix or send it back to where he had gotten it from.

Captain Hart didn’t argue, not even when he was then sent after the alien corpses in the Central Server and the Weevils at the police station.

Ianto went down to where Jack had left Gray and lifted him up and carried him to a cell.  He wasn’t sure how long he was going to be busy and he didn’t want to risk being caught out again.

He then began to co-ordinating things with the emergency services.  Toshiko and Owen had at least managed to deal with the nuclear power plant and it could be safely left until help arrived.

Now that the Weevils were back in the sewers, Ianto sent the police to find the people best able to help, some to work at the nuclear power plant, some with the expertise to repair the damage at the Central Server.

He then used his contacts to get the army mobilised as well.  Gwen had already set things in motion to ensure the police were maintaining calm in the city.

For several hours Ianto Jones ruled Cardiff until enough had been done for the city to look after itself.  Then he called Rhys, told him what happened and asked him to take Gwen home.

With Gwen gone Ianto lifted Toshiko onto the autopsy table.  He stripped, cleaned and prepared his best friend for cryogenic freezing only to be stopped before he could prepare her casket.

The look in Jack’s eyes held his wishes and instead Ianto placed her in one of the temporary freezer draws.  He then broke the bad news to Toshiko’s family and began to arrange her funeral.

Owen had no body to bury so Ianto arranged a memorial service for him.  He broke the news to Owen’s mother and listened to her hysterics as she shouted at him like it was his fault.

Jack headed to his quarters and Ianto knew it was to change.  He needed to wash the soil, ice, blood and tears from him.

That meant that right now, while Jack was away, Ianto had some scrubbing to do.  He had to wash away Toshiko’s blood from the floor of the Hub and autopsy, remove all the signs of what they had lost.

Jack was still in his quarters when he had finished so Ianto decided he should shower and changed to.  He was quick and efficient, he couldn’t afford to linger, couldn’t afford tears.

When he finished changing into his spare suit he cleared out Toshiko and Owen’s lockers.  He then scoured everywhere but the main Hub for traces of them.

When he returned he saw Captain Hart coming up from Autopsy.  The look he gave told him that Jack had decided to cryogenically freeze Gray.

He didn’t think anything could be done to restore Gray’s sanity either, but his death right now could completely destroy Jack.  Ianto had killed his own feelings to cope so had no desires for revenge, no desire to kill but he intended to add security to the cryogenic chamber later to prevent any escape.

That was the same reason Ianto justified letting Hart go.  It would only be a painful reminder if he stayed and his death would undo Jack.  Hoping the ex-Time Agent didn’t harm anyone, was all he could wish for.

Ianto went with Jack to the morgue to inter Gray’s body.  He stayed silent and was not even sure the Immortal was even registering his presence.

From there Ianto followed Jack to Owen’s apartment.  He had hoped to do this job alone but the Captain obviously wanted it done before Gwen returned.

They cleared what little Owen possessed into boxes, saving a few items for his mother to collect.  The medic had done most of the clearing away himself after his first death.

Clearing away Toshiko’s apartment was worse.  It might have been a different one from the house they had stayed at after the incident in the Brecon Beacons, the one where Ianto had stayed over while Jack was away, but it still invoked the same memories.

It was silly little things, a DVD, a chick lit book she claimed wasn’t really hers, the shampoo and the spare pyjamas she kept for him, all threatened to overwhelm the Welshman.  Ianto let a few tears escape but when he heard Jack in the next room he brushed them away and reinforced the barriers around his feelings.

“Sorry Tosh but he needs me to be strong for him,” he whispered and returned to the living room where Jack was sobbing.

Ianto held the Immortal while he cried, then made him sit on the sofa while he sorted out the rest alone.  The Welshman made sure there was a couple of boxes of things to return to Toshiko’s family carried them down to the SUV, he would come back for the rest later.

When they got back to the Hub he began to work on the reports, things that would normally be for Jack to do, he worked on them for the Immortal.  He then did little jobs around the place, anything he could think of, but he didn’t touch Owen or Tosh’s work station.

He knew Gwen would be in the next day.  Like Jack she needed work, needed to keep busy to help deal with grief.

Ianto left them to clear away their colleagues’ things, let them mourn as they remembered the people they lost while he logged them out of the mainframe.

He wasn’t expecting Toshiko’s message.  It was so like her, so thoughtful.  He felt the tears threaten again but with Jack and Gwen there he couldn’t let them fall, not yet.

“Now we carry on,” Jack said, his voice sad.

“I don’t think I can after this,” Gwen whispered.

“You can, we all can,” Jack said putting an arm around each of them.

Ianto could tell he was trying to be the strong leader, could tell he wasn’t quite succeeding without them.

“The end is where we start from.”

They stayed there together for a while and Ianto felt a little awkward.  He stayed to give Jack his strength, but he wanted to go away and hide until the pain he felt inside himself went away.

A Rift alert sent them back into action.  A simple retrieval job but they were all skittish, alert, sensitive and trying not to argue or fuss.

Ianto made sure Gwen was in the Hub while he went to the archives and made sure he stayed in the main area after she left.  There was so much to do and prepare; so much to learn now that they no longer had a technical genius or medic.

The Welshman worked on the mainframe until the words made no sense.  Did jobs around the Hub until the world went dark.

When he woke up Jack’s nervous face was leaning over him.  He felt guilty for worrying the Captain so soon.

He ate the sandwiches he’s been given while Jack told him a story, made a request then dashed away before Ianto could even process what was asked of him.

The Welshman looked around realising he is in Jack’s bed in the Hub.  He reaches over for his jacket, left haphazard on the floor but right then he didn’t care, and got his PDA.

Ianto used it for a few minutes to make Jack’s request a reality.

Then he lay back in the dark, too tired to move.  For the moment there was nothing left for him to do.

Ianto curled on his side and let the tears finally fall.  He wept for Toshiko, he wept for Owen and he wept for Jack.


	2. Chapter Two

There was something infinite in the patience of Ianto Jones.  It was something that Jack was always grateful for.

Three times before Gray buried Jack beneath Cardiff he had been on the verge of making this special request of Ianto.  Each time a combination of cowardice and the ample distractions of his life made him dismiss the idea.

After being buried for two thousand years, Jack knew that he was different.  It is not only because of his just penance or the loss of Tosh and Owen.

He felt older, slightly disconnected from the world, as though twenty-first century Cardiff was just a pleasant dream amongst the pain.  Ianto and Gwen are his grounding rods.

Ianto most of all.  Jack watched him as he worked, sorted away the paperwork, organised the funerals, made sure he and Gwen ate and drank.

Jack knew right now his sanity wouldn’t survive if Ianto wasn’t looking after it for him.  Like Toshiko’s blood on the floor, it was gone when he immerged from his quarters, and that make it easier to shut his brother away in a cryogenic chamber.

He was a rock as they packed away Owen and Toshiko’s things.  The steady one as he and Gwen fell apart with each tragic memory that surfaced.

Jack knew Ianto hadn’t given himself time to mourn.  He let him and Gwen have their grief but, ever the carer, he allowed no sorrow or resolve for himself.

The worst thing was that that was exactly what Jack needed him to do.  The Immortal kept finding himself spacing out, like the world didn’t have the synchronicity with him it once did, until Ianto’s presence drew him back.

It is only as the Immortal watched his movements become less graceful that he realised he was slowly killing the young man.  That it wasn’t just grief Ianto was denying himself, but food and rest too.

As he watched Ianto collapse, Jack felt panic grip him.  It was too soon, too raw, but he had drained the young man of strength without giving thought to his needs.

Jack froze and waited for Gwen to start shouting at him for not taking care of Ianto before he could feel relief.  She would not have yelled at him if the Welshman wasn’t alive.

He ignored the rest of Gwen’s berating and carried the young man down to his quarters and laid him on the bed.  Twenty minutes later she came down carrying a huge plate of sandwiches and some water for Ianto.

She said nothing as she returned to the Hub.  Jack didn’t really notice her leave, his eyes were fixed on the young man who terrified him so much.

It was as he watched that Jack remembered his special request.

It shamed the Immortal to see guilt in Ianto’s eyes on waking.  _He half works himself to death then feels guilty because he made me worry_.

Jack gave Ianto the sandwiches to stop the young man from trying to make him feel better, to stop him from distracting the Captain from his purpose.  Although the delight he felt watching the Welshman eat almost succeeded.

“Ianto I would like to do something with you.  It’s a little unusual and I think you will probably say no or that, if you say yes, I won’t do as good a job of it as I hope and you won’t like it,” Jack began nervously.

In the silence he risked a shy glance.  Ianto’s face tells Jack the Welshman understood that Jack was not using innuendo, just expressing himself badly, an effect only Ianto seemed to have on him.

“Ianto being... you know,” he paused and shuddered but continued.  “It reminded me of when I did service during the Great War. 

“At least underground it was silent.  No blood, bombs or death around me.  Constant asphyxiation is not as bad as being routinely shredded with bullets and shells.

“So much death and pain but I was always untouched in the end.  I didn’t have you waiting then.  I didn’t have the hope and desire that I might see you alive.”

Jack tentatively reached out and touched Ianto.  He had been distancing himself a little from the young man, afraid that his failure to save Tosh and Owen would make Ianto reject him.

Ianto, as always, just waited patiently for Jack.  Patiently but firmly, there was no way Ianto was going to make Jack think he was alone in this, even though he wasn’t expecting Jack to be there in the same way for him.

Ianto just leaned into the touch, his face telling Jack so much that words could not.  It encouraged him to continue.

“After the war I went a bit off the rails.  I was only freelance with Torchwood then and I didn’t even care if the Doctor decided to turn up.

“I ended up somewhere in London.  I fell in with a Bohemian crowd.  I had a little money saved and I was always a con artist or whore enough to make more.

“I fell in with an artistic set, did some modelling for them to start with.  They mostly didn’t care about the real world and they embraced me simply because they felt like it.

“I took up art.  They taught me to express myself, to paint.  People, the world, still life’s.  They liked some of my work, hated others.

“I never had the courage to let my work be displayed in public.  Don’t know what happened to some of them.

“Most were destroyed when an irate ex-boyfriend decided to torch my studio.  Just because I had to miss dinner once to hunt an alien for Torchwood.” Ianto smiled at that, too many of their dates had been cancelled by Torchwood.

“I want to paint you Ianto.  You can wear your suit, anything.  I want to commit every beautiful inch of you to canvas and oils.” Jack spoke in a rush and Ianto just sat there looking stunned.

“Your right it’s not appropriate.  I don’t know what came over me.  Stay here.  Rest.  Is that the rift alarm going off?” Jack said hastily and beat a retreat up the ladder and out of the young man’s sight.

Jack did not return to the Hub that night so that he could let Ianto rest, and avoid any awkwardness.  He left his mobile on but knew Ianto would only call him if there was a work emergency.

When he entered his office the next day there was a huge parcel sitting on his desk.  Unable to resist any package he checked it was for him and ripped it open.

Inside was a collapsible easel, a palette, several canvases, a selection of readymade and make up your own oil paints, acrylic paint, watercolours, white spirit, assorted sizes of brushes, palette knives, charcoal, pencils and sketchpads.

The aroma of coffee hailed Ianto’s entrance and Jack turned in delight to see his lover’s sad smile.

“I have no idea why you have decided on such a poor subject matter for the return of your artistic streak, but I thought you should at least be fully kitted out.

“You always seem to spend a lot of time watching me so I thought you could use the sketchpad to help you decide on the pose.  Then just tell me what you want me to wear and we’ll see what happens.

“You don’t even have to show me.  They can be for your eyes only, forever,” with that he quietly left.  

All Jack could think was that only the most beautiful, wonderful man in the universe could think himself a poor subject matter for a mediocre artist, especially when he deserved Grand Masters.

 


	3. Chapter Three

Gwen turned up early for work with Rhys in tow.  She hadn’t intended to go early, not today, but Ianto’s collapse, Jack’s reaction to it had worried her.

She felt guilty that she hadn’t noticed how hard the Welshman was working.  To be fair both he and Jack had insisted that she go home each nigh,t and her need to be with Rhys meant that she took those opportunities.

Gwen needed Rhys’ love and Jack’s strength to carry on at Torchwood.  What she didn’t want to admit was that she needed Ianto too, needed his quiet organisation to see everything got done, needed his ability to know what she needed, needed his reassuring presence as much as Jack did.

The jealousy Gwen might have felt in the past was long gone, firmly buried by recent events.  She could accept now that Ianto gave Jack strength the way Rhys did for her. 

Now she realised there was no one giving strength to Ianto.  Normally it would have been Toshiko that he turned to, but that wasn’t possible anymore.  Gwen had never had the close relationship with Ianto that the technical genius had.  Ever since the Beacons, Toshiko was the one that looked after and protected the Archivist.

She knew that was her fault.  Despite her marriage Gwen knew her crush on Jack had only really died that night she caught him and Ianto in the hot house.  The combination of seeing them together, realising the Captain trusted Welshman with secrets and was willing to listen to him when her own efforts at persuasion had failed.

Of course Gwen had been making an effort to be Ianto’s friend before then. 

Since the night they watched the meteors and discussed the beauty of the stars in Jack’s absence, although Gwen had gone there because she was afraid he would jump but it turned out he was wearing a safety harness, she had become as fond of the Welshman as she was, had been, of Owen and Tosh.

Having Ianto in the field helped, danger situations always bring people closer together.  Only Ianto’s attitude to field work wasn’t like theirs.  The tragedies he had already suffered marked his attitude, he reacted with swiftness but remained mostly thoughtful and cautious.

When Ianto collapsed, Gwen saw Jack freeze in fear.  She was as terrified as the Immortal that Gray had injured him and neither of them had noticed.  The Welshwoman examined him knowing that neither of them would bare his death on top of the other two.  There would be no ‘the end is where we start from’ after Ianto.

Relief flooded her as she had felt his pulse, witnessed his lungs take in air.  It was obvious too that he was exhausted and wondered when he’d last slept, last ate.

She shouted at Jack because it was too much.  Gwen didn’t apologise later either, as she recognised that her anger at him was what returned the Immortal from the well of terror he’d been plunging into.

Instead she let the Captain carry Ianto into his quarters and went to make sandwiches before climbing down into Jack’s bunk to deliver them.  The Immortal’s care and concern were obvious. 

What was worrying was the way Jack’s hands twitched, not quite touching the unconscious man.  At first she thought it was a fear that he might hurt Ianto, then she realised part of him seemed unsure that his touch would be welcome.

If Jack had said anything she would have scolded him again.  Of course Ianto would want him to touch him; having had to stop him from shooting John Hart was proof enough of the Welshman’s feelings for the Captain.

Like Jack though, she remembered Ianto after Lisa, after the Captain ran off and left them.  Gwen berated herself for not remembering that the Welshman would go into workaholic overdrive and shut everyone out. 

Ianto hadn’t quite done that this time but only because Jack needed him.  She had learnt that the Welshman would take care of any of them if they needed him and neglect himself. 

Gwen felt sure now that he’d had taken time to mourn either; he was bottling it up and would shatter later.  She hoped that by then Jack would be ready to pick up the pieces and she intended to be there to help him.

Jack emerged from his office, soberly dressed, and nodded to Gwen and Rhys.  The lack of verbal greeting spoke of how much the Captain wasn’t really himself.

“How is he?” Gwen asked.

“He ate the sandwiches, thank you, and slept through the night.  He was exhausted but he got up as usual.  He’s out right now making the final arrangements.

“Jack you shouldn’t have let him,” she admonished.

“Gwen he wanted to do this.  He wants to spare us and he wants honour Tosh, this is Ianto’s way.”

“Alone?”

“Yes alone,” Jack replied as though it was a matter of deep regret.

They shared a look, a look that apologised to the other for not noticing.  Then sad smiles as they both acknowledged their grief had blinded them.

Jack’s phone rang and he answered it.  The conversation was short and when he hung up he looked to Gwen and she knew it was time.

Gwen turned to Rhys and took his arm.  They followed Jack up through the Tourist Office to where Ianto was waiting with the car.

The Archivist nodded a greeting to all of them and opened the door.  They found Martha Jones waiting inside and she greeted them quietly.

Ianto started the car and they travelled in silence to Toshiko Sato’s funeral.


	4. Chapter Four - The Mourner and The Guardian Angel

**The Mourner**

 

Jack got the inspiration for his first painting of Ianto as the Welshman stood at Toshiko Sato’s graveside.  It was not an image he had intended to paint when he made his request and was one of only two paintings that he the Archivist never saw.

The Welshman had hung back after the funeral, let everyone else pay their respects before approaching the grave himself.  Jack watched as he stood still for a moment, silent except of the pain screaming from his eyes.

The look on Ianto’s face was one Jack had seen to many times.  It was an aspect of his lover he never wanted to exist, but it was a futile want.

As Ianto stood silently saying his farewells to his best friend, Jack took out his little sketchbook.  The Welshman was still enough for him to get the gist of the details, right down to umbrella and the sprig of Jasmine he had held to lay upon Toshiko’s coffin.

It was only a rough sketch, but over the weeks that same distant look would reappear in Ianto’s unguarded moments.  It was the same look Jack had seen after the Archivist first joined; the look that prevented him from seducing a man who had hidden a Cyber-girlfriend in his basement.

Jack worked at the painting alone, whenever Ianto was asleep or out.  He used the room in the basement were Lisa had died, knowing that the Welshman would never go there.

It wasn’t that he was ashamed of his first attempt, but as he worked on capturing Ianto’s grief he poured in his own.  The atmosphere in Lisa’s room helped, it was where her Ianto died and his Ianto was the embryo that was left.

As he worked, he wondered if Ianto wore that look every time Jack died, did he enter a limbo of mourning waiting to be reawakened with his immortal love.  It was a question he didn’t want to ask, but was certain the answer was yes.

When he was finished, Jack wondered how, even in grief, Ianto could look so beautiful.  Jasmine had become a Torlea flower, an alien bloom that was as much a symbol of love in the fifty-first century as a rose was on twenty-first century earth.

Behind Ianto was an autumnal graveyard whose residents included Toshiko, Owen and Lisa.  In a morbid mood the filled grave the Welshman stood beside was Jack’s own.

As Jack had painted his solitary mourner, he formed a plan for this first painting.  It was a whimsical, probably foolish plan that might never come to pass as he only had one conversation to base his hope upon, but it was a plan he felt he needed to carry out.

Once the painting was finished he packed it away, hid it safe outside the Hub using his future knowledge in order to preserve his work.  Over the millennia it was destined to remain always safe, always waiting.

 _The Mourner_ ’s final home was to be on New Earth in the City of New New York.  It was given into the charge of Novice Hame after the Face of Boe rescued her from the Bliss virus.

When the Doctor had departed, Novice Hame journeyed to New Cardiff in New Wales.  There was a mausoleum was already built into which the Face of Boe was to be interred.

Upon the wall beside his grave was hung the painting of _The Mourner_ , forever paying his farewells to the man he loved.

 

 

** The Guardian Angel **

 

The day of Ianto Jones’ funeral Jack began to paint his final work.  It was his only self-portrait, for he painted himself in grief.

Where Ianto had been a silent, still, gentlemanly mourner Jack’s mourner was a mess of tears kneeling beside the grave, screaming at life’s unfairness.

All the pain, aguish and loss he felt at the death of his lover he expressed in this painting of himself beside Ianto’s grave.  All those feelings he was too afraid to acknowledge poured into oil and canvass.

No one who ever looked at this wretch beside the grave ever doubted the love he felt.  They could imagine him the kind of man who, if left alone, would pine beside the grave, forever broken.

When Jack finished it he just turned away and never looked at it again, never saw exactly what it was that he had painted.

What Jack never saw was that beside his grief-stricken figure he had painted the ghost of Ianto Jones.  His hand rested on the Immortal’s shoulders giving the same comfort, healing, love and reassurance that his living counterpart had always bestowed.

Anyone looking at the painting knew the depths of the mourning figure’s grief but felt hope in the comfort his beloved gave from beyond the grave.  They felt love’s power and were moved by it, by knowing the grieving wretch would be alright.

The painting was found when the Torchwood team came to pack Ianto’s things away.  They were unsure what to do with it, so gave it to a friend of Jack and Ianto’s to look after.

When that friend in turn died, her family sold the painting and it was bought by an art museum.

It was the second most famous of Jack’s work and a great tourist attraction, people who had lost someone would make pilgrimages from all over the world to see it and take hope from the sight of it.

 _The Guardian Angel_ was lost during a fire that burned the museum to the ground.  It was the only painting that a passing Doctor had been unable to save from the blaze.

 


	5. Chapter Five

Ianto had managed to book the dining room of the Lost Dragon Hotel for Toshiko’s wake.  The room was really too large for the small gathering but it had been Toshiko’s favourite restaurant and she and Ianto had dined there often.

Jack had visited to a different area of the Hotel with the Welshman too and the Immortal had the feeling that that wasn’t going to happen again.  Here Ianto was saying goodbye not only to his friend but the life outside of Torchwood that they had shared together.

The Immortal watched as the Welshman played the part of host.  He kept Toshiko’s family away from Jack telling them the stories that were half truth, half lies (for security sake only), to give them peace, to let them know Toshiko was a hero.

It should have been him.  He should have been the one telling Toshiko’s mother that her daughter was a beautiful, brave woman who saved the city at the cost of her own life.

But Jack couldn’t face her.  He had been the one to take her from her family.  Okay there had been some kidnappers, and a UNIT detention squad first, but he was the one who kept her away.

He was the one who was meant to have kept her safe.  He was her boss, her leader, her friend.  He was the Immortal one who was meant to go into danger first, the one who was meant to protect his team.

He had failed Toshiko Sato.

Despite Tosh’s final message Jack wasn’t quite ready to accept how much he had done for her.  How much she had blossomed from the downtrodden worker at a MoD think tank to the cool, calm, confident agent who faced aliens and cannibals with strength, efficiency and grace.

Now he felt guilty because he was glad Ianto was there keeping them away, protecting him from eyes that might accuse, or worse be sympathetic.  He felt guilty because while outwardly the Welshman was polite and sociable, Jack could see that deep inside he was screaming to be left alone.

Jack sat across the room from him and got his sketchpad out again.  Every now and then he caught the look in Ianto’s eyes that he’d seen at the funeral and hastily captured it.

Mostly though he sketched different aspects of Ianto, his posture and his facial expressions as he spoke to the guests.  Jack could see the lies as he spoke and the truth in his silence.

He was so engrossed that it wasn’t until she sat beside him that he noticed Martha Jones.  She made him jump and he gained a small smile.

Martha looked at the sketchpad and he passed it across to her.  Given the sober nature of his drawings he didn’t thing Ianto would mind her seeing.

The doctor looked from Jack to Ianto, to the sketches, then the Welshman several times then back to Jack again.  The Immortal knew her next words were going to be of sympathy or understanding and he wanted neither.

“Are you going to stay for...?”

“Yes I have a room,” she replied looking at his other sketches.

“No Tom though,” he said gently.

“Some sort of crisis came up, he’s stuck in Africa,” she sounded a little unhappy about it but the only thing he could think of to say was...

“I’m surprised you managed to get away.”

Martha gave him an incredulous look.  She stared at him as though trying to determine if he was lying or not which confused and hurt him, he wouldn’t lie to her; well not unless it was to save her.

“I’m in the middle of an important top secret project, one few people know about.  Yet when Ianto called to break the news he used my direct land line.

“When I requested my leave it was granted it immediately.  Not only that by UNIT flew me down here in a helicopter and there will be another one to collect me to take me back,” she said her voice edged with suspicion.

Jack turned from her to Ianto.  He wondered what threats or blackmail the Welshman had used to get Martha here.

At that moment though one of the hotel waiters who had always had a crush on Ianto walked over to him carrying a plate of food and some fruit juice.  Jack watched them talk a little and the man only left after the Archivist ate a few of the things on his plate.

Jealousy surged through Jack.  Not even the man’s polite nod towards him placated him.

Jack stood, not realising that he dropped the sketch pad.  He stalked towards Ianto fully intending to stake his claim, to let the Welshman know who he belonged to.

He was halted by the despairing eyes that turned to him briefly then looked away.  Ones that saw no hope in his presence and were quickly masked away.

Ianto was just about to set the plate down, still mostly uneaten when Jack reached him and stopped him.  He led the Welshman to sit and then began to pick from the plate himself.

They sat side by side, untouching, but eating from the same dish.  When that one was finished Martha brought another, surreptitiously returning the sketchpad to Jack.

When that plate was finished Jack guided Ianto up.  He looked completely drained so the Immortal asked Martha if she would look after things while he took the Welshman home.

They should have gone to Ianto’s flat but Jack didn’t want to intrude and didn’t want to leave.  Instead he took the Welshman back to the Hub and down to his quarters.

They stripped to their underwear and he laid them both in the bed, under the covers.  Jack slipped an arm beneath Ianto and the young man curled up over him.

It didn’t matter that it was barely the middle of the afternoon.  As Jack heard Ianto’s breathing deepen he let his hand’s wander protectively, possessively over the man he needed, the man who scared him the most.

 


	6. Chapter Six

The Rift alarm sounded frighteningly close.  It took a moment for Jack to realised the noise was coming from Ianto’s PDA.

It was too late though.  Ianto was out of his arms, pulling on his clothes and up the ladder before Jack had a chance to react.

The Captain put his clothes back on slowly.  It was a childish protest but right then Jack didn’t want to hurry to please Ianto’s first mistress, Torchwood.

When he emerged, Ianto was immaculate and wearing his business mask.  He handed Jack his gun and helped him on with his coat while giving him the report details of a Rift opening in an old warehouse.

It was too out of the way to appear of the local police radar yet and the size of the Rift spike suggested a large object or a small living being.

Jack decided that they wouldn’t disturb Gwen, not on the day of Tosh’s funeral, unless it was too much for the two of them.  Ianto was fully armed and now seemed his normal, in control self, which made the Immortal really wish the Welshman had also been allowed a break from Torchwood today.

They crept into the warehouse on high alert.  There was a citrus smell in the air that didn’t belong with the general mouldy odour of the building.

Jack kept his eye on Ianto more than he did his surroundings.  That’s why he missed the sudden attack.

Before he knew it a four foot green alien covered in ridges knocked him to the ground, claws tearing at him.  He cried out and shot at it, then cried out again as the bullet ricocheted off the alien’s hardened skin and into his leg.

Then suddenly Ianto was above them.  He pressed his stun gun to its neck.

Jack felt the jolt slightly but the alien when completely rigid then limp.  Ianto lifted the alien off of him and carried it a short distance away from him.

The Immortal saw Ianto inject then cuff the alien, securing it to a pipe.  He then went straight to Jack.

He pressed his hands into the Captain’s wounds but Jack knew it was already too late.  The last thing he saw as the darkness claimed him was Ianto’s haunted, despairing eyes.

Jack jolted back to life and felt relief to find his head in Ianto’s lap.  The relief only lasted the few moments it took to realise that the Welshman’s staring eyes were unseeing.

“Ianto,” he said softly but there was no reaction.

Fear gripped him and he scrambled up.  He felt the Welshman’s steady pulse and sighed, but Jack would not let relief touch him, that Ianto was alive was the only thing to be relieved about.

As part of the Welshman’s mental training at Torchwood One he had learnt to hide inside himself.  The idea was to let his body suffer without it touching his mind, so that he could resist torture, keep Torchwood’s secrets safe and be immune to others being threatened by not being there to acknowledge the threat.

There had been times though when life had been too much and Ianto had just retreated.  It terrified Jack every time that maybe he wouldn’t want to return.

Jack didn’t think Ianto had hidden in himself since he returned from his travels with the Doctor.  He had never hidden after the Captain had died before, he was always there when the Immortal returned, always made him want to return.

“Ianto please come back to me.”

Jack remembered that while the Welshman’s conscious mind was hidden his subconscious was still aware.  Ianto needed to feel safe before he could come back.

A warehouse with Jack covered in blood with an unconscious alien wasn’t exactly safe.

Awkwardly Jack lifted Ianto up and carried him back to the SUV.  He strapped the Welshman in and promised he would be right back.

He then went back for the alien and shoved it in the boot.  Jack really couldn’t care less about it but he didn’t want to be scolded by Ianto, or worse have to force the Welshman to return here because he left it behind.

As he drove back to the Hub he told a story knowing how much Ianto liked them.  He didn’t even realise that he was telling the Welshman about how he lost Gray, how he had dragged a friend to war to find his brother and lost him too.

When he got back to the Hub he threw the alien in the cell first.  Ianto was still staring into space so he carried him down to his quarters, stripped and washed them both.

Seeing the bruises on Ianto’s left shoulder made him wince.  Owen had given him a once over at the warehouse bombing but Jack didn’t think anyone had checked since to see if Ianto was having any problems.

Jack felt a little uncertain about lying naked beside Ianto but he couldn’t bear anything between them.  He was careful of the shoulder and touched the Welshman the way he had earlier but there was no response.

“Please don’t leave me,” Jack begged quietly, tears cracking his voice.

“Never,” came the whispered reply.

He blinked away the tears to see Ianto looking at him.  There was something powerful in the young man eyes that Jack couldn’t identify but it was the first time an emotion other than grief shone in the blue.

Ianto reached up and gently wiped his tears away.

“I’m sorry,” the Welshman whispered.  “I’m sorry.”

Jack held him close and they clung together as they wept.


	7. Chapter Seven

When Ianto woke he regretted organising Owen’s memorial for the day after Toshiko’s funeral.  At the time he had hoped that the sense of closure would help them move on quicker.

He hadn’t expected the Rift to send them a dangerous alien so soon.  He hadn’t expected Jack to die.

Ianto shied from where that thought might lead and realised that Jack had shifted their positions in during the night.  How he was spooned into the Immortal’s chest, the hand beneath him over the Welshman’s heart.

It was Jack’s second favourite sleeping position.  Unless they’d had sex and he didn’t want to withdraw, they only ever used it when the Captain was feeling protective, when something happened to remind him that Ianto was a fragile mortal.

Sometimes Ianto loved that side of Jack, loved feeling wanted and protected.  Occasionally it irritated him, he didn’t want to feel vulnerable like he was made of glass.

Today though Ianto just felt numb.

The position was correct, the scent of futuristic pheromones, the warmth but the man behind him still wasn’t quite Jack.

Last night when Jack died Ianto hadn’t meant to retreat within himself.  He knew the Immortal would come back after witnessing it too many times, after the first was too many, but he seemed out longer than usual.

Today Ianto could rationally say that, having been buried for nearly two thousand years, his immortal reflex could be forgiven for being a little slow.

Last night, after weeping and begging Jack to come back, even the slight delay was more than he could cope with.  Ianto couldn’t help thinking that the delay was because he didn’t want to come back.

Hidden within himself, Ianto only ever had a partial knowledge of what happened around him.  He remembered Jack’s story though, the tale of him and Gray as children, of what he’d done to try and find his brother.

Ianto didn’t want to hear Jack blame himself for what his brother had done.  It was a child’s mistake, an accident of panic, not his fault but he blamed himself.

Part of Ianto wanted to comfort Jack, to return to consciousness and tell him it would be alright but he was overruled by the part that felt it was a lie. 

Tosh and Owen were gone and, while he didn’t blame Jack, Ianto knew that things wouldn’t be alright again.

It was only when the Immortal begged him not to leave that Ianto knew he couldn’t hide anymore.  He had promised himself, promised Jack, that he would always be there for him and no matter how terrible he felt, he wouldn’t break that promise.

Part of Ianto wished he had broken his word because Jack didn’t kiss him.

While Jack tended to withdraw from the world a little when he lost someone important, danger, almost losing someone else, always sparked passion in him.

Ianto was withdrawn too, he wasn’t ready to renew his sexual relationship with Jack, but at that moment he could have done with a little passion, if not passion then a tender kiss.

The arms that circled him felt like Jack’s, touched like Jack and yet there was something missing.

As Jack held him and the tears fell, Ianto had silently pleaded, _I need you so much but if it’s over Jack, please end it soon.  My heart is still numb, I can bear it.  If I have to heal before you break things off, I don’t think I could survive._

As soon as Ianto realised Jack knew he was awake, he made the excuse of getting things ready for the day and dived in the shower.  The Welshman dressed, feeling self-conscious of doing so in front of the man who was his lover for the first time in ages.

The first thing he did was check the new guest.  He was alive and unhappy and the bioscanners hadn’t been switched on in his cell last night.

Ianto felt a spark of hope at that.  Jack was always Torchwood’s man first, the fact that he had been so upset he hadn’t turned on the scanners gave the Welshman a little hope.

Then he dismissed it seconds later.  Jack always found anything bad happening to his team disturbing.  He may be Torchwood first in the middle of the action, but in the calm it was always his people who were the most important and now he only had two left.

_Perhaps that’s it.  There are only the three of us left now, that’s what Jack wants to cling to.  Two thousand years is a long time to care for someone._

_He knows that our relationship is the best way to keep me in Torchwood.  I’m yours Jack, lover or Archivist, you don’t need the pretence._

Ianto turned the bioscanners in the new guest’s cell on then began to potter about the Hub.  He wanted to be busy; he didn’t want to think about Jack, Owen or Tosh.

As he worked, Ianto noticed Jack sitting in the doorway of his office, in his office chair.  The Captain had one of the sketchpads in his hand and was working intently on something.

Curiosity got the better of Ianto.  He knew he promised Jack that what he drew he didn’t have to share, but at this moment he needed to know.

What he saw surprised him.  What he saw gave him hope.

As he found himself in Jack’s arms again they still didn’t seem right, but this time he realised his reasoning had been wrong.  After all Two thousand years was a long time for a lot of things.


	8. Chapter Eight

Jack could feel the tension in Ianto as soon as he woke, feel something was worrying him.  With Owen’s memorial today he knew there was a lot to think about, a lot to do, but after last night he just wanted a little time holding Ianto.

Yet as soon as Jack tried to draw the Welshman in closer to him, he suddenly said he had things to organise and dived in the shower.  There was an air of rejection about Ianto as he dressed, like a one night stand who regrets knowing that they’ve blown their chance for more.

Jack replayed the moment Ianto returned from within his mind.  He had meant his promise and clung to the Immortal with the desperation of one who’d almost lost a loved one.

Somehow though he had done something wrong, he’d upset Ianto in some way.   Jack had been holding the Welshman close last night never wanting to let of go him, and yet in the morning he felt rejected.

A panicked thought sent Jack rushing to the shower himself.

Ianto couldn’t be allowed to find out about the sketches of himself as a mourner.  He had to speak to Martha too make sure she never mentioned it either.

It wasn’t that Jack thought Ianto would feel that the sketch, or his planned painting, was an invasion of his privacy; the Welshman felt his grief was very private.  It also wasn’t that Jack had very personal reasons for doing the painting.

It was just that, if Ianto ever saw the sketches or the painting, they would upset him.  The Welshman wouldn’t see a figure of serene dignity giving honour and respect to those loved ones he had lost.  He would see a miserable sod that no one would find attractive.

Ianto’s self-esteem always lessened when he was unhappy.  He felt unattractive and couldn’t understand that such vulnerability triggered all Jack’s protective instincts, and a few of his erotic ones.

Jack couldn’t just hide the sketches though.  Ianto would know he’d been drawing, especially as the Immortal suspected he would have opportunities to perfect _The Mourner_ ’s image for a while yet.

That meant that he had to sketch something else, anything else.

He set his chair in the doorway to his office and began to sketch what he saw, not caring for what it was.  The image seemed so familiar to him, this was Ianto cleaning after all and he had witnessed him doing it many times before that this sketch would be perfect.

Jack was so engrossed in his work that he didn’t hear Ianto move up beside him.  It was only when he heard the slight ‘Oh’ that he chose to look down and saw what he had drawn.

It was a sketch of the Welshman putting a pizza carton into a rubbish sack.

_Great, way to go Jack.  Instead of letting him see a drawing of himself in mourning because you think he would see himself as miserable and unwantable, you do a most flattering picture of a man taking out the trash._

Apprehensive, Jack looked up and was surprised to see a sad smile on the Welshman’s face.  He held his hand out to Ianto and the young man took it, letting himself be drawn onto the Immortal’s lap.

The chair groaned beneath the weight of the two of them but they both knew it had withstood more vigorous activities involving their combined weights.

“What do you think?”

“It reminds me of my first day here,” Ianto replied.

Jack looked at the sketch again and memories of that day returned.  He had felt as nervous then as he did right now too.

He remembered wanting to impress Ianto.  Everyone else tended to give the cavernous Hub a look of awe and become speechless for a few minutes.

Ianto had looked around unimpressed and slightly horrified.  It had taken a while for the penny to drop that the Hub was in a mess, and the Welshman decided to forgo the guided tour in favour of filling an embarrassing twenty black sacks of rubbish.

“Do you like it?” Jack asked quietly.

Ianto moved closer putting an arm around the chair and resting his head on Jack’s shoulder.  He used his free hand to move the sketch pad to a different angle before resting it on his chest.

“It’s not what I expected, but that doesn’t matter.”

The image that they must present to the world suddenly seemed very wrong; and it had nothing to do with them never having sat this way before.  If Gwen walked in she would think they looked very romantic.

Jack didn’t feel any romance right now.  There was something very melancholic about Ianto.

He wrapped his arms tighter around the Welshman silently begging him never to leave him.  Ianto stroked his thumb against Jack’s chest as if to say it would be alright.

It was then that Jack realised what had upset Ianto this morning.  What it was that made him feel rejected.

Jack knew that he wanted Ianto, needed Ianto with a desperate urgency he hadn’t felt since the Doctor and Rose left him.  The moment of jealousy yesterday was an uncomfortable confirmation of that.

Yet for all his want and need, Jack hadn’t felt any arousal at all.


	9. Chapter Nine

Ianto’s phone rang destroying the fragile comfort they were getting from sitting together.  The Welshman stirred to get the phone and whispered, “It’s Martha,” to get Jack to allow him to answer.

The Welshman got off of the Captain’s lap and talked briefly to the UNIT Doctor.  Jack heard the invisible lift activating seconds later.

“I asked Martha yesterday if she wouldn’t mind giving me a full physical before she left,” Ianto explained.

“Is something wrong?” Jack asked unable to keep the concern and panic from him voice.

“It’s nothing like that but I recently dislocated my shoulder and collapsed from exhaustion.  I want to make sure there are no complications and that my records are up to date.

“I’ll go and make sure the medical bay is prepared,” the Welshman stated and was off.

The Immortal starred after him until he was out of sight, then walked towards the invisible lift.  Martha looked around for Ianto as she reached the bottom and only Jack was there to greet her.

“Hi Jack.”

“Hi Martha.  He’s gone to prepare the medical bay.  Be gentle with him he doesn’t really like doctors that much.”  She looked at him in confusion so he added.

“He isn’t asking you to look at him for himself.  He’s doing it for Torchwood.  There’s only three of us and we need to be fighting fit,” he added bitterly.

“I should have asked you to do this.  I should have organised the funeral, made sure you attended not him.  Tosh was his best friend I should...”

“Jack,” she said firmly making him look into her gentle brown eyes.

“I may not have known Ianto for long but I do know that this is his way.  When you were out looking for the glove after... He was the one who looked after everyone, prepared Owen.

“Looking after others first it’s what he does.”

 _Without looking after himself_ , Jack thought but couldn’t say it.  Ianto wasn’t just trying to compensate for the lack of Tosh and Owen, he was compensating for the effect that loss was having on him and Gwen.

_He’s doing so much for us, so much for me.  Now the Little Captain seems to be out of commission, I don’t have anything to give him in return._

Jack was aware that neither he nor Ianto were in the mood for sex.  Grief had affected them both with the same numbness.

Still he should have felt something earlier.  His body had always been able to react to Ianto, even if his mind had no intention of carrying it through.

To Jack it felt like, on top of grief, he now had to face the reality that he was going to lose Ianto too.  Not straight away, not while the Welshman was still in mourning, but afterwards, when he was ready to renew their sexual relationship and realised the Immortal wasn’t up to it.

_I’m not Captain Jack Harkness anymore.  It isn’t just that I’m no longer able to bring pleasure to others, it’s yesterday in the warehouse._

_I shouldn’t have dropped my guard and let that alien attack me.  I shouldn’t have needed Ianto rescue me.  I should have timed my return for earlier then we wouldn’t have lost Tosh and Owen._

_If I’m not Captain Jack Harkness who am I?  I can’t become what I was again and Ianto wouldn’t accept me as an ordinary guy would he?_

_The hero part of my persona has never appealed to Ianto as a lover, that’s why he’s so perfect for me, but he needs the hero for Torchwood.  All he’s ever wanted is for me to do my best to save his planet and I’m not sure I can do that anymore._

The touch of a hand to his arm jolted Jack out of the downward spiral of his thoughts.  He looked up into Martha Jones’ concerned eyes.

Martha hadn’t seen him at his worse, only Ianto had, but she’d seen him damn close before.  He wasn’t sure how much her family told her about what happened on their year aboard the Valiant, and how much they had concealed to protect her.

_Yes, only Ianto has seen me at my worse.   It’s why I came back to him.  I needed his patience, his gentleness, his compassion, his forgiveness, his l..._

_I need Ianto to heal me again and now I have nothing to give him back.  Am I just using him? clinging on to what we had because it’s familiar, because I know he cares?_

Again Martha squeezed his arm bringing him back.  He forced himself to smile at her to reassure her that he was alright.  The brush of her thumb told him she wasn’t fooled but would let him have his way for now.

“Look after him for me won’t you?”

“I will Jack,” she promised and with a final reassuring grip, Martha made her way to the medical bay.

When she was out of sight, he looked down at the sketch in his hands.  He felt a rush of affection looking at it, the familiar image of Ianto taking care of things.

_No this isn’t habit or desperation, I felt this way about Ianto before I left for the end of the universe, before I spent over a thousand years underground._

_I will not lose him now._

_I have a painting that I need to finish,_ Jack thought feeling the well of grief thinking about Toshiko and Owen always brought.  He didn’t want to upset Ianto or Gwen with his pain, that’s why he had chosen to paint the Mourner in private.

Jack looked again at the sketch of Ianto.  He knew the Welshman would see him through this; he was stubborn and wouldn’t give the Immortal up without a fight, unless the Captain made it clear that he wasn’t wanted.

 _Be patient with me Ianto, I do want you_ , Jack thought silently as he caressed the face to the sketch.  _I do._


	10. Chapter Ten

Martha Jones made her way to the Medical Bay in a cloud of worry about Jack.  His behaviour reminded her of those few days after the death of the Master, when he wouldn’t stop washing then pretended everything was fine so that he could leave.

She had taken the Doctor’s lead and chosen not to push him.  Jack had shared that quality with the Time Lord of trying not to think about certain realities, then masking the pain of them, one with information, the other with flirtation.

So they had left him in Cardiff hoping that the Torchwood team and responsibility were enough to help him heal.

When she had come to visit before, while investigating Reset, she had seen that he’d become a different Jack.  More like the man she met at the end of the universe, but without the bitterness.

Martha had been wary at first that it was just an act.  Her own family were still shaken and none of them ever spoke of what they, Jack or the Doctor had done on the ‘ _Valiant’_ , she only had vague guesses and none of the imagination to know for certain. 

Yet the difference between Jack and them was that he knew the risks beforehand and accepted them, the Master forced danger on her family.  Preparation of course didn’t always help, or she might not have left the Doctor.

It was when Jack asked for a UNIT cap that Martha realised there was a reason for his more speedy recovery.  Suddenly “My team... responsibility” became “Ianto”.

In many ways that surprised her, sure the Welshman was a looker but he was quiet, slightly shy, efficient, organised and business like.  He didn’t seem like the sort of person who could entice the outrageous, flirtatious Captain Jack Harkness.

She was wrong of course.  In those mad days of her visit Ianto had proven to be passionate, patient, witty, gentle, thoughtful and the owner of a dazzling smile too rarely seen.

Martha had watched Ianto pull not only Jack but the rest of the team and herself through the upheaval of Owen’s death and resurrection.  Indeed he’d been the first to really accept the medic’s new status and helped him cope with it.

So far Ianto seemed to be coping with the loss of Owen and Tosh the same way he had with the medic’s first death.  There would be no return this time for either of them, and Martha was just as worried as Jack about the consequences of the Welshman’s delayed grief.

Especially as Jack didn’t seem to be coping at all. 

Like when they returned from the ‘ _Valiant’,_ Jack seemed fine on the surface but the eyes told a different story if you knew how to look.  His behaviour was a little manic in its attempts at cheerfulness.

Ianto had only given her the basics surrounding the loss of Owen and Tosh.  There was an edge of guilt about Jack, like he felt it was his fault, the same way the Doctor had felt responsible for the Master.

Her thoughts had brought her to the medical bay.  She entered and found everything she needed included her patient.

She smiled at him and he stiffened.   Ianto crossed the distance between them and handed her a file.

“My medical notes Ma’am”

_Ma’am?_ Martha thought with dismay.  Yesterday she’d been ‘Martha’ today she was ‘Ma’am’.

_Be gentle with him, he doesn’t really like doctors that much_ , remembering Jack’s words helped.  When she’d crossed the threshold she’d become a doctor, someone Ianto was weary of.

Martha accepted the file and moved towards the equipment.  Ianto was looking tense, so she gave him another smile and indicated that she was going to read his notes first.

Only in the front she found a letter

 

Hi there,

           If you are reading this letter then you are very privileged.  Ianto has obviously decided to trust you and let me explain a few things about his medical history.  I know you’re privileged because I expect he’s read his medical file and allowed this note to remain.

           You may have noticed that Ianto is a skittish patient.  He told me once that when he worked for Torchwood London he had a friendly, pleasant doctor.  A doctor who was later discovered to be giving dangerous, untested alien drugs to her patients.

           Ianto escaped this fate by being involved in a sanctioned Torchwood experiment which required regular checkups.  That is an entirely different can of worms and the details are in the highly classified medical records which you are not currently holding.

           He’s also stubborn and tends not to tell anyone he’s hurt so it has to be really bad before he mentions anything so make sure you keep an eye on him.  Ianto tends to overwork himself and not eat properly although he’s been better since Jack started keeping a closer eye on him.

          All of this means that if you are reading this letter it can be for only one of two reasons, the first is that I am now gone and you are my replacement doing a routine medical.

         The second reason is that there’s a problem and Jack has chosen to entrust you with Ianto’s medical wellbeing in which case you have my complements Martha Jones.

 

Tears suddenly blurred the words.  Martha could practically hear Owen’s voice, the slightly bored, slightly sarcastic tone that was critical and compassionate.

She felt a spike of pain remembering the friend she’d only known a few days but whose life, death and undeath she’d been a part of.  She had still kept in contact with Owen as they consulted each other on various cases.

And now his memorial service was in a few hours.

Gentle hands guided her to sit down and gently took the file from her.  Gingerly an arm was placed around her and she turned into the man beside her and wept into his shoulder as he ran a hesitant, then more confident, hand reassuringly down her back.

“I’m sorry Martha I didn’t know that letter was there.  I don’t actually read my medical file,” Ianto said apologetically as her tears lessened.

Martha felt mortified.  She was supposed to be a professional doctor and she’d just broken down in front of her patient.

The soothing motions down her back told her it was fine.  Also, he’d called her Martha and Ianto didn’t seem as tense as he was before.

She moved away from him and he retrieved a handkerchief from his top pocket and handed it to her.  Martha smiled to realise it matched his shirt perfectly as she dried her eyes.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Is there something troubling you or do you want to do this another time?” she asked gently.

“I dislocated my shoulder during the attack on Cardiff.  Jack reset it but I want to make sure that it and everything else is okay.”

“Alright then strip off,” she said before she realised it.

Ianto blinked at her then gave her a small smile before embarrassment could flush her cheeks.

“It’s a good thing I know you’re an engaged woman or I might feel uncomfortable complying with that order.”

“It’s a good thing I know your jealous boyfriend or you might have every reason to,” she replied easily.

Ianto though didn’t smile instead he looked away withdrawing from her slightly.  It was almost as if he had no idea how much Jack cared about him, the obvious adoration in those sketches yesterday despite the sombre images.

“Hey,” she said not knowing what to say, too wary of pushing him away.

“Sorry, I’m just worried about Jack,” he replied and slipped his jacket off.

As Martha began her medical exam it struck her that she was in the presence of a master liar.  The Doctor and Jack may have centuries more experience than Ianto but she could bet that his silent professional masked his untruths better than their verbal diarrhoea. 

Yet, like the Doctor and Jack, the eyes betrayed him if you knew what to look for.

Not that Martha felt Ianto would openly lie to her, unless it was to protect her, Jack or Torchwood.  She sensed though that he was deemphasising his discomfort and how much his grief was affecting him.

Medical exam complete, she updated his notes, both hand written and on the mainframe, then prescribed him some pain killers if his shoulder injury flared up.

While she did that Ianto dressed and they returned to the Hub together.

As they entered the main area Martha caught a glimpse of Jack sitting in his chair in the doorway to his office.  He looked lost and lonely as he stared at the sketch pad in his hands.

Ianto deliberately made a noise causing Jack to look up.  His whole being lit up at the sight of the Welshman.

“Everything go okay?” he asked.

“Everything’s fine Jack,” Ianto reassured but the Captain looked to Martha and she nodded before he relaxed.

“It’s time,” Ianto said gently.

The three of them looked at each other not wanting to move.  None of them wanted to do this but it was one of those things life gave no choice about.

All three took comfort and strength from each other before they went together to honour Doctor Owen Harper at his memorial service.


	11. Chapter Eleven

Ianto snuffled closer to Jack in his sleep making the Immortal feel slightly guilty.  He had no intention from parting from him though, his Welsh hero.

It seemed a strange parting gift, but where Toshiko’s funeral was a reserved, sombre affair full of silence and honour, Owen’s memorial was noisier and left everyone feeling slightly pissed off.

In both cases the general mood could be traced to a single source, the mother.

Jack really couldn’t believe Owen’s mother.  Her son might have been a surly, irritable man but he also had compassion, tenderness and genius hidden beneath his grouchy but wild facade.

He had always assumed that it was a result of Katie’s death.  That, like with Ianto, grief had changed him, but now Jack felt sure he was wrong.

Owen’s mother seemed to think that it was her duty to attend the funeral, but that it was an inconvenience to her.  Gwen shed more tears in grief, Ianto in his silence seemed more moved by loss than she.

All she did was complain and criticise Owen from his birth to his death until Jack felt himself get really angry and wanted to hit her.

Then Ianto stepped in.  He politely but firmly informed her that Owen had died a hero preventing disaster that could have destroyed the city, and that they were there to honour him for that and his friendship. 

He then said, in the politest way possible, that she was being incredibly rude, insulting and disrespectful to the memory of the friend he had come here to honour.  That having met her he now found Owen to be more remarkable than he had believed and thanked her for that.

Ianto then turned and left every inch the respectable, dignified mourner Jack would portraying him to be in his planned painting.

They all followed him away from Owen’s mother.  Gwen sent Rhys to fetch the car then promptly kissed Ianto on the cheek to thank him for stepping in and prevent her from punching the woman.  Martha kissed the other cheek before confessing she had been thinking of slapping her too.

There was no way Jack was going to let the two girls outshine him.  With a wicked grin he stepped up and kissed Ianto firmly on the mouth, pressing into him, lingering as much as he dared.

When they broke apart he regretted it.  While there had been passion in their kiss there was still no arousal and, looking in his eyes, Jack could see that Ianto knew it.

To divert attention away, Jack asked Martha how long she was staying for.  Regretfully she only had enough time for lunch before the UNIT helicopter came to collect her.

Gwen immediately suggested that they go to the pub and honour Owen in a way he had often honoured others.  Jack agreed instantly and rapidly made sure that Ianto drank several pints; he had Martha to thank that Ianto ate something too. 

Ianto wasn’t normally a big drinker, and Jack felt guilty that he would feel it in the morning, but he had wanted the Welshman to forget, forget the pain and grief of his life, forget the kiss that told him of the little Captain’s lack of response.

Ianto didn’t usually like getting drunk and this time was not like before.  Usually he was quiet a merry, slightly wild drunk.  This time he was melancholic, depressed and got quieter the more he drank.

When Martha said it was almost time for her flight, the atmosphere was so heavy that the excuse to go was a relief.  Ianto managed to leave the pub and say farewell to her with dignity.

Gwen scowled at him before she left with Rhys and Jack knew he deserved it.  He drove Ianto home and was able to get them to the sofa before the alcohol overcame the Welshman’s motor skills.

They snuggled up on the sofa and after a while Ianto softly began to cry.  Jack wrapped his arms around him and held him close until the young man fell asleep.

Guilt overwhelmed Jack now and he had to extricate himself from the sofa.  He couldn’t stay there getting comfort from Ianto, not after he had betrayed him. 

It was a betrayal, getting Ianto drunk, forcing him to lose his carefully held control.  The Welshman would never have let Jack feel his tears and, while the Immortal wanted to be the one Ianto trusted and took comfort in, at the moment he couldn’t give the young man what he needed.

He couldn’t leave Ianto, not right now, not unless the Rift called.  If it did the Welshman would be angry with himself for being too inebriated to help, even though Jack had no intention of letting the young man out of the Hub on a mission any time soon.

Jack wanted to touch him, hold him and curl up with him.  He didn’t deserve any of those things.  Not after getting Ianto drunk so that he would forget the little Captain’s inadequacies.

He couldn’t go, he couldn’t stay, he couldn’t just stare without wanting more and yet feeling so distant.

So Jack turned to his sketch pad and began to draw.

Ianto always looked so young when he slept, so beautiful.  Sometimes after passionate lovemaking he would look so at peace, happy and content.

Jack didn’t want to think about that.  About the happy past that was less than a week, and yet nearly two thousand years, ago.

A whimper halted the Immortal’s hands.  Ianto jerked slightly and Jack knew he was entering a nightmare.

Instantly he abandoned the sketchpad.  He touched and spoke softly, reassuringly, until Ianto stilled again.

Jack moved back onto the sofa, slid back under the Welshman’s embrace.  Ianto snuggled into him making a soft, contented noise.

The Immortal still felt guilty about what he had done but now he was too afraid to let go.

 


	12. Chapter Twelve - The Administrator

After Owen’s memorial service, Ianto found himself confined to the Hub for all but the most routine investigations and those situations where there needed all three of them to cope.

While Ianto wasn’t happy about it, and was determined that it was only a temporary situation, in a way he was glad.  It gave him the opportunity to work in the archives while the others were out.

Most of the time Ianto was confined to the main Hub.  If he needed to do clean up jobs around the place he usually had an escort, unless Gwen distracted Jack for him.

So Ianto spent most of his time sitting at what used to be Toshiko’s workstation.  It didn’t bother him because he knew his friend would want to have her baby used to help save the world.

Jack was also making no pretence about doing any work.

In the field he was his usual sparkling self.  In the Hub he helped with the tech work and with dealing with the aliens, living and dead.

Yet when it came to reports and admin work Jack would instead be found sitting close to Ianto sketching him.  The Immortal had begun to dictate his reports to the Welshman so that they would get done.

He almost got into trouble with Ianto doing that.  Jack began to give a salacious description of an alien they encountered which made the Welshman feel increasingly hurt and angry.

Jack was saved by Gwen who had been listening and said.

“What are you talking about?  They were squat, blue, cylinder shaped and covered in suckers.”

There was a heavy pause before all three of them realised that Jack had been describing Ianto.

“In your own time please boys,” Gwen said gently into the embarrassed silence.

The next day Jack decided he was ready to paint Ianto officially.  He set up his easel, canvas and paints not far from the Welshman and looked up to see a strange look on his subject’s face.

“You’ve changed your mind haven’t you,” Jack stated disappointed.

“You just startled me with your noise.  How do you want me?” Ianto replied easing the Immortal’s tension in an instant.

“As you were, working away.”

Ianto hesitated but he turned back to the computer.  Jack began his initial sketch with charcoal but something wasn’t quite right so he looked back at his model.

“You’ve gone all tense.  Gwen,” he called and the ex-PC appeared.  “Do you have any reports you’d like to dictate to Ianto?”

As Gwen hurried away to get some notes Ianto gave Jack a glare which said he’d better make this up to him later.  The Welshman turned to their colleague before he could see the guilty look on the Immortal’s face.

Ianto began working on Gwen’s reports and relaxed in the way Jack wanted for the portrait and he started painting.  However when the end of the day came it wasn’t finished so the Immortal asked the Welshman if he couldn’t mind wearing the same suit, shirt and tie the next day.

The Welshman agreed and when they went to his home he washed the shirt and dry cleaned the suit for the next day.  When they arrived at the Hub, Ianto glared at Gwen, daring her to comment but she just smiled and began dictating more reports.

The Rift interrupted their painting session and it was a big one requiring the three of them.  When Jack and Ianto returned to the Welshman’s home that night they just collapsed into bed.

That meant the next day Ianto wore a different outfit.

It seemed strange to Jack that he could do his ‘ _Mourner_ ’ from memory but he couldn’t imagine the correct suit on Ianto with him sitting right there.  So instead he concentrated on the background to the painting.

When they went back to Ianto’s, Jack again asked him to wear the suit he begun the painting in.  The Welshman agreed to make him happy and cleaned the suit in question.

Jack decided that he wasn’t going to take any chances.  He asked Ianto to bring an overnight bag the next day then, when they finished work, he invited the Welshman out to dinner.

While Ianto was showering Jack took the suit and headed out to find a convenient dry cleaner who would get it clean in a few hours and be open late enough for him to collect it.

He then returned to the Hub to collect Ianto and took him out to dinner.  It was almost a disaster of silence as he wasn’t in the mood for his usual stories, but his brilliant young man saved the situation by asking about his artistic friends.

After dinner Jack suggested that Ianto go and collect something for breakfast.  While he was shopping the Immortal got the suit from the dry cleaners.

They curled up in bed that night for a few hours before Jack snuck out and hid all their clothes except for the suit.  The next morning when it was all he could find Ianto gave the Immortal a glare, but put it on anyway.

The portrait was almost finished but again they were interrupted by the Rift.  They collapsed exhausted into Jack’s bunk, but for the second night the Immortal snuck out to get the suit dry cleaned.

Jack however had gone too far.  When Ianto awoke and saw that there was only the one suit available he just turned away from it and hid under the coveres.

Nothing the Immortal could say persuaded the Welshman to get out of bed, not even the threat of inviting Gwen down. 

The Immortal hated himself then.  If grief wasn’t bad enough, he had made Ianto feel miserable by forcing him to wear the same clothes over and over.  Part of him knew he should stop, but he wanted the portrait done.

In the end it was the Rift that forced Ianto back into the suit.

There was enough breathing space in the chaotic day for Jack to finish the portrait.  However before he could announce its completion, the Rift called them all out again.

Ianto was exhausted and miserable, when he went down to the Immortal’s room.   Jack was half sure that if they hadn’t needed to be with each other so much at the moment, the Welshman would have happily gone home alone.

Jack helped Ianto out of the suit and gave him a massage.  The Welshman was asleep before he was half way through.

The next day Jack could see it was a great effort of will for Ianto to even look to see what was available to wear.  When he did though, he was in for a surprise.

There waiting were three brand new suits with six shirts and ties.  Ianto turned to him and kissed him passionately.

He returned the kiss gladly, but a flicker of fear passed through Jack that Ianto might continue and realised that the Little Captain’s problem.  Instead the Welshman broke off the kiss and got up to inspect his suits.

He then dashed to the shower before returning to eagerly put on one.  Only Ianto could make dressing so erotic, except the Little Captain seemed to disagree.

When Jack dressed himself and got to the Hub, it was to find Ianto staring thoughtfully at the portrait.

“What do you think?”

“It’s good.”

“You sound surprised,” Jack said feeling a little hurt.

“Well you hardly had the best subject matter,” the Welshman replied and in a way his self-depreciation hurt more.

“I know I said I would pose for you anyway, in anything, but I have to tell you I can’t wait until you start painting me in the nude, it will make things so much easier,” the Welshman said and Jack stared at him stunned.

“Just, please, not anywhere in public, or where Gwen could see,” he added squeezing Jack’s shoulder.

Ianto then walked gracefully towards the archives.  Jack wanted to follow, felt the stab of need urging him, but he stayed put.

The Welshman was so different this morning.  There was something lighter about him.

Jack was under no illusions that Ianto was over his grief, but there had been a touch of joy in this morning’s kiss.

Like he was free. 

Jack couldn’t argue with that.  Today Ianto was free, free of wearing the same suit, free of doing everyone’s admin work, and a little free of the Immortal’s constant presence.

Jack didn’t like the thought that he was responsible for the darker side of Ianto’s new freedom, so he turned to look at the painting.

By his own standards it was good.  He had captured a man who was hard working and dedicated but there was also something of the misery Ianto had been feeling in _‘The Administrator’_.

Jack turned away from the painting and headed down to the archives.  He didn’t go after Ianto instead he headed for the room where he was painting ‘ _The Mourner_.’

He knew he had to finish that painting today because Jack intended to have no more opportunities to see Ianto in the grief or misery that inspired the picture.

 

 

 _‘The Administrator’_ was the only painting that neither Jack nor Ianto ever had on display.  When the issue of the Immortal possibly selling his work arose, it was the one Jack chose to test the water.

It made quite good money and was soon adorning the first of many offices where, over the centuries, it gained a strange reputation.

To those who were born to be administrators themselves, those that organised, those that used databases with relish, it was a painting to look at with pride.  To those who were destined for something else it inspired them to go for their dream.

In the Twenty-Eight century _‘The Administrator’_ became the symbol of the working people, their loyalty and dedication.  When the social revolution came a century later, it was the first thing to be destroyed.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

There was something liberating about getting a new suit.  Ianto had never noticed it before but having spent most of the week in the same clothes it was fantastic.

If he had been Gwen, Ianto didn’t doubt that she would have had a go at Jack, firstly for forcing her to wear the same things over and over again, and secondly for dictating what she would wear afterwards by buying her new clothes.

Ianto however had his own reasons for not protesting.  He had suffered the same suit because Jack wanted to paint him and the Welshman felt that the Immortal needed to paint to heal.

What he hadn’t expected was that he would feel such unhappiness himself.

He’s been okay at first with indulging Jack’s creative side, more than that he’d been flattered.  Yet after the first few days it didn’t matter that Gwen was dictating reports to him, in the quiet pauses, when there was no work to do, he couldn’t help thinking those he’d lost, Toshiko, Owen and Lisa.

Lisa had long ago become a dull ache combined with fond memory.  Yet this experience reminded him painfully of the aftermath of her loss.

Before the Cyberman’s presence was revealed to the others, Ianto had been spending almost all his time in the Hub.  Apart from the occasional mission or shopping trip, the closest he’d gotten to sunshine was when he manned the tourist office.

Then there was the hell of the beginning of his suspension.  If this had been Torchwood One the punishment for what he’d done was death, but as Jack had Retcon he had known that was the more likely, more humane option.

Instead when he packed all his things ready for collection, Jack had put them all away.  Then Jack took him out for meals where he talked about his adventures instead of questioning his prisoner.

One day Ianto finally snapped unable to take the agony of waiting for his interrogation and torture.  He told Jack about the battle of Canary Wharf and getting Lisa away and that he was ready for his punishment, death or Retcon.

Jack of course had never had any intention of using either option.  He’d been trying to make a mends because Ianto’s accusation that he didn’t care had struck home, he’d given him a chance because he understood that what he’d done had been for love.

Returning to work felt no different than before.  Lisa was gone, and he was hollow inside, but he was there to serve, to do whatever he could to make Torchwood efficient and help them save the planet.

Time had changed that, Jack had changed that with their relationship, with his leaving, with Gwen letting him become a field agent and with Jack’s return.

It was irrational, especially as part of him had already decided he would do whatever it took to help Jack, but the past few days, being confined to the Hub, wearing the same suit kept giving him emotional flashbacks to that terrible time.

Only when he couldn’t take anymore, he couldn’t lash out.  He couldn’t hurt Jack not now.

Neither Jack nor Ianto were big on talking about deeply personal or intimate things unless they needed to.  Instead they communicated in looks, gestures and touches, only Jack was no longer sending quiet the right messages.

Staying in bed was the only protest the Welshman could muster.  Yet while Jack tried to persuade him to don the suit and leave the bunker, the Immortal remained beside him with his arms firmly around Ianto.

In an hour Jack might have persuaded him to leave without the rift alarm.  Before he might have used a different tactic, then agreed that bed was really where they both belonged.

Such tactics it seems were no longer at the Immortal’s disposal even if the Welshman had felt able to reciprocate them.  Ianto was happy to wait for Jack, sex was after all only the bonus.

There are some things in life worse than death, torture is one, loss of a loved one is another.

Jack had experienced both and now he was terrified of losing more.  Ianto wasn’t sure how much the Immortal was aware of his fear, but it was obvious to the Welshman that it was the root of his current lack.

Ianto indulged Jack, hoping that with creating art he would start piecing himself together.  Instead the Immortal remained overprotective and became obsessive.

Part of him said that he should have put his foot down like Gwen would have.  The need in him to have his Jack back overruled such protests, encouraged by that part of Ianto that couldn’t help liking the feeling that he was wanted by his insecure immortal.

Ianto knew it wasn’t doing either of them any good.  Yet his own grief and fear of loss made him too terrified to do something about it.

So the sight of new suits this morning, the signal that the ordeal of the first painting was over, had been joyous.  A passionate kiss conveyed both Ianto’s gladness and that Jack was both delighted with the Welshman’s happiness, and worried about their future.

He also accepted the gift of new suits because Jack owed them to him. 

Ianto had been very fond of the suit he’s been painted in, it held a small sentimental value.  It was the one he’d been wearing the night before Tommy left, when Jack told him he wouldn’t change being able to love the people he had for the world.

Now Ianto wasn’t sure he could stand to wear it again.  Sure he had the portrait as a permanent reminder, but the Welshman wasn’t the sort of man to spend time staring at himself.

A smile crossed Ianto’s face as he remembered the shocked look on the Immortal’s face when he said he couldn’t wait to be painted in the nude.  The stab of guilt he felt immediately after that thought confirmed that he was no more ready for sex that Jack was.

It was something they both needed to work on though and perhaps the intimacy of being painted naked would help.  It was also a less than subtle hint that Ianto wasn’t going to go through wearing the same suit every day for a painting again.

_Perhaps that was a hint to many._

With a sigh Ianto gave up on the faint hope that maybe Jack would follow him down here.  The separation was a good thing but the Welshman couldn’t help missing the Immortal’s presence.

Then he shook himself and got on with the huge backlog of archiving work recent events had left him with.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Gwen Cooper arrived slightly late at the Hub to find it empty.  She was fairly sure that no Rift Alarm had gone off because Jack would have called her in.

She spotted the painting Jack had been working on and wandered over to take a look.  It was good despite being a dull subject, and Gwen felt a slight stab of jealousy towards Ianto.

However much she would love having someone to paint her, even in such a boring pose, she would not go through what Ianto had.

Jack and paperwork had never exactly gone together.  In her more suspicious moments Gwen had wondered if Ianto used sexual enticements to get it done.

It was a notion she usually dismissed in favour of the more obvious, coffee bribery with a stunning smile for very good Captains that the Archivist openly employed.

Since Owen’s memorial Jack hadn’t bothered with the paperwork at all.  He was pulling his weight with the action and tech, but leaving all the boring bits for Ianto to do.

The fact that Ianto was letting him get away with it worried her.  The Archivist might not be as obvious as her, but he was capable of saying no to Jack.

That meant he had another reason.

Jack only taking her out on missions when he could, his constant following Ianto around the Hub, she understood that.  There was part of her that wanted Rhys always at her side, and part of her that was glad he had nothing to do with the dangers of Torchwood.  If he had been a part of them, she would have kept him confined to the Hub too.

Ianto, like Rhys, was not a doormat.  If Gwen had tried that with her husband, he would yell at her for being daft and assert his independence while telling her that he loved her and understood how she felt, but it was tough and she would have to accept that.

It wouldn’t make her feel any better about the situation but it would have made her feel better about his ability to cope.

Ianto of course didn’t have the security of knowing Jack loved him.  It wasn’t just Jack’s normally constant flirting but the Welshman’s insecurities about his own desirability that gave him doubts.

It reminded Gwen painfully about her own ill-fated affair with Owen.  Even though it was just about lust and needs Rhys couldn’t fulfil at the time, she couldn’t help feeling jealous when she learnt the medic had fallen in love with Diane.

It wasn’t that Owen was better in bed than Rhys, he wasn’t.  When she really needed him, her husband was far more satisfying than the medic ever was.

At the time though, the secrecy had made Gwen feel like she was cheating on Rhys before she’d even kissed Owen in an autopsy draw.  The excitement didn’t help either, compared to the madness of Torchwood it made her then boyfriend seem so mundane.

Rhys though wasn’t mundane, he was the one that grounded her, gave her the reality check she needed amongst Torchwood’s insanity.  Now she could talk to him about her strange days and he would listen and laugh or comfort or make love to her like the perfect man he was.

It wasn’t quite the same for Jack and Ianto. They were both Torchwood men through and through, but where the Immortal brought the excitement, Ianto brought the grounding, the common sense.

Only right now he wasn’t.

Gwen admitted that she could know Ianto better than she did, but one thing she did know about him and that was his pride in his appearance.  The Archivist liked to be immaculate and had managed to get such variety into what seemed like a uniform dress-code.

She could tell that wearing the same suit all the time was getting him down as much as having to do the whole team’s admin.  Part of Gwen wanted to say something, but the eagerness on Jack’s face, the small smiles Ianto gave him despite his unhappiness, halted her objections.

Gwen wondered for a minute if the pair were still in bed.  Yesterday she could tell posing for the painting had really gotten too Ianto, and he refused to get up until the Rift alarm sounded.

She dismissed the idea as she looked at the portrait.  It was finished, which meant Ianto could go back to wearing whatever he liked.

Gwen acknowledged that thinking about Ianto’s wardrobe problems was just her way of avoiding the issue.  Whatever the Archivist’s reasons for indulging the captain, it pointed to the fact that there was something wrong with Jack.

Jack might not have a brilliant track history when it came to looking after Ianto, but it isn’t easy to take care of someone that hides them self.  That though was in the past, and Gwen was certain the Immortal knew his lover well enough by now to see him clearly.

So why didn’t Jack see the pain his behaviour was causing?  What was so important about a painting that he would add unhappiness to Ianto’s silent grief?

That wasn’t like Jack at all, and maybe that was the point of Ianto’s attitude.

“I hope it was worth it,” Gwen said quietly to the painting.  “because it isn’t going to happen again.”

Gwen was prepared to let Jack shirk his paperwork.  She didn’t really feel like doing it herself right now, but she would for Ianto.

She was also going to let the Captain continue his painting.  If Ianto was willing to suffer for art then it had to be important.

It was the suffering bit that was going to stop.  Also confining Ianto to the Hub that was going to stop too.

Jack was the one that wanted them to continue, wanted them to rebuild Torchwood after Tosh and Owen.  Well they were all bloody well going to do that.

Gwen looked around the Hub full of determination, then sagged when she realised she was still alone.

She went over to her desk and got out the photo of Owen and Tosh that she’d stolen from the technical genius’ personal effects. 

“Hello,” she said to the picture.

Gwen looked from the photograph to the portrait of Ianto then back again.

“He’s trying to remember.  Trying to preserve what he has.  He’s afraid of losing...”

She sighed and looked down at the photo again then she stuck it up by her monitor.  Gwen looked at each of her friends and promised them.

“I’ll do my best.”

 

 


	15. Chapter Fifteen

When Jack finished his picture of Ianto as a mourner he just stared at it.  Tears blurred his vision, a mixture of grief and guilt.

He let them fall, let himself feel those terrible emotions to powerful to resist.  When there were no more tears he dried his eyes and made his way back to the main Hub.

Gwen looked up when he appeared and smiled faintly.  Jack could tell it was to make him feel better, not better from his grief so much as to hide the fact that she disapproved of the way he’d been treating Ianto.

Jack couldn’t blame her after all, _he_ disapproved of the way he’d been treating Ianto, he just wasn’t ready to stop himself.  If he tried that again the Welshman would probably walk out on him and he’d only have himself to blame for that.

No, Ianto wouldn’t walk out on him but knowing that was worse.  It meant that he would willingly again suffer to make him happy, and Jack couldn’t accept that anymore.

He returned the smile at Gwen and hoped she would understand that he acknowledged his fault.  He had already had an idea of how he would make doing his next painting easier, and it wasn’t going to be by painting Ianto naked.

Jack knew he should have loved that idea.  If he’d had the courage to ask Ianto if he could paint him earlier then erotic art would definitely have been his goal.

He was glad that he hadn’t had the courage before.  Ianto was worth far more to him than sexual gratification and it took a problem with the little Captain for him to fully appreciate that.

Ianto’s mentioning painting him in the nude was worrying Jack a bit.  _Does it mean Ianto thinks all I think about is sex? Or does it mean that Ianto’s ready for the little Captain to do his thing?_

Jack dismissed his second thought.  Ianto was one of nature’s thinkers; he needed a certain degree of confidence and certainty before he felt spontaneously horny.

It was ironic really, neither of them were up for sex, yet it seemed both of them were thinking it was all they had to interest the other.  It was true in Jack’s case even if Ianto wasn’t sexually demanding.

_It isn’t as though I can give him the care and attention he deserves.  He always takes much better care of me than I do of him._

The thought brought his eyes towards the Administrator.  It was best that he put it away somewhere safe; he didn’t want the memories associated with it to linger with Ianto, especially as he had already decided on his next work.

Today however would be a complete break from painting for Ianto.  Also three suits weren’t really enough, dinner, going out, that should let him know how sorry Jack was for what he’d done.

Jack carefully picked up his painting and carried it down to the storeroom where he kept his larger keepsakes, furniture and ornaments acquired for a house he never got around to owning and living in.

He put the painting down and stood back to check that the oil paint hadn’t smudged in the journey.  It was fine and in here it had a better chance of drying that way.

Jack was about to leave but he turned back to look at the painting.  It was a horribly perfect portrait of Ianto; it showed his dedication, his loyalty, his hard working nature and his willingness to put all his personal feelings aside to get the job done.

Only the job this painting represented wasn’t Torchwood it was _him_.  Jack doubted Ianto would have let Torchwood One make him wear the same suit every day unless lives depended on it.

“You’re too valuable and precious to be abused like this by me.  I’m sorry,” he said but the portrait could offer no forgiveness.

The man who could was working hard even now.  He was probably in the archives getting on with his work as though he hadn’t spent the better part of the week doing other peoples.

He had to get out and he had to get Ianto out of here.  He had to get them both away before he let Torchwood destroy them, and Gwen too.

“Ianto stop whatever you’re doing and come up to the main Hub.  Gwen call Rhys see if he’s free, we’re all going to the park,” Jack called over the comms.

Gwen got off the phone as Jack entered.  Ianto arrived shortly afterwards and headed to one of the store cupboards and returned with some blankets.

The Welshman then set the Hub’s alarms to be relayed thought Jack’s wrist strap while the Immortal grabbed a few things.  They headed for the SUV and drove there just in case they needed it.

They walked for a while in the park, neither member of his team questioning why Jack suddenly had a desire for fresh air.  Ianto had a small smile on his face as he took in the beauty around him and Gwen gave him a look of approval.

It wasn’t a brilliantly warm or sunny day but it was dry and pleasant enough.  Ianto checked to see if either of them wanted anything before spreading the blankets and lying down.

A phone call interrupted them twenty minutes later.  Jack and Ianto turned to Gwen with alarm but she smiled as she answered it and began to give Rhys directions to their location.

Gwen’s husband arrived shortly afterwards laden with carrier bags.  He kissed his wife in greeting then began to distribute the feast he had brought with him.

They sat together silently eating and watching the people go past.  Jack and Ianto shared a look as they remembered being in a different park with Toshiko the day after they returned from the Brecon Beacons.

Jack could have kicked himself.  He was trying to make Ianto feel better and instead he had given him a reminder of the best friend he’d lost.

A hand gently touched his arm.  Jack looked from it to Ianto’s face and saw a faint smile there.

Jack returned the smile feeling relieved.  Yes being here had reminded Ianto of Tosh, but it was a good memory, a healing memory.

After lunch Jack passed the Archivist a book he’d grabbed from his office.  He knew that Ianto liked to do things even while relaxing.

It was such a delightful sight that he wished he’d brought his sketchpad to capture the image but Jack had promised that he wouldn’t do that today, that he would give them all a break.

Ianto casually turned the page of his book then reached into his jacket pocket.  Without looking at Jack he passed him a small sketch pad then reached into another pocket to retrieve a pencil.

The Immortal stared at the young man in disbelief.  After a minute Ianto looked up, flashed Jack a too brief but beautiful smile, before turning back to his book.

Deep emotion flooded Jack.  He felt happy and dazed and worried and afraid all at the same time.

He couldn’t face such feelings or their meaning, not yet.  They were too soon pushed aside by the guilt and remorse that told Jack he really didn’t deserve someone as understanding as Ianto, not when his half of their relationship was becoming a lie.

A tension began to spread across Ianto’s back.  That meant he knew the Immortal wasn’t sketching and was about to look at Jack with concern.  The last thing he wanted was to worry the Welshman.

So Jack sat back and let his mind focus on his pencil and this rare peace he was being allowed to capture.

 


	16. Chapter Sixteen – Welcome to Wales, The Archivist and Friends in the Park

Jack’s solution to the dilemma of Ianto having to wear the same clothes all the time was to paint three pictures simultaneously.  It meant they took longer than ‘ _the Administrator_ ’ but it made for a happier Welshman.

Mood and the events of the previous day always dictated which painting they worked on.  There were also days where Jack took a break from painting and just sketched.

Every night, regardless of which bed they ended up in, Jack would lie naked in it while Ianto performed a slow striptease.  He would then lean over the Immortal for a passionate kiss before curling up around him to sleep, making him regret the little Captain’s little problem.

Jack wondered if Ianto knew of that particular trouble and was trying to tease him into reacting.  The alternative was that he was gifting the Immortal with the only sexual gift grief made him capable of.

If the latter then it was another good reason to go slowly with these paintings.  Every night Jack stared at beauty he wished to capture in paint but he didn’t want to push Ianto if he wasn’t truly ready.

Sometimes as he painted they talked.  Jack found himself returning to his stories and loved the way Ianto relaxed to his words.

He felt closer to the Welshman than ever.  He felt the Little Captain wrenching them further apart.

Gwen however was magnificent.

Ianto’s feelings for him meant that he had no will to resist Jack’s whims.  He would have let Jack get away with anything regarding himself and a few things he shouldn’t regarding Torchwood.

Gwen wouldn’t allow that.  A week after ‘ _The Administrator_ ’ was finished she made him do his own paperwork again.

Although Ianto said nothing beyond saying that he didn’t mind doing Jack’s paperwork, the Immortal could tell he was relieved.  It was enough for the Captain to start doing his reports again with only a token complaint.

For a few weeks they continued in a strange, ever shifting, routine that blended painting, alien hunting, investigating and admin.  It wasn’t what they had had before, but they were content for the moment, they were afraid change would destroy the fragile healing of their hearts.

 

**Welcome to Wales**

 

‘ _Welcome to Wales_ ’ was the first of the trio of painting Jack began and the last one that he finished.  The delays had nothing to do with the flexibility of the routine for Ianto’s sake, and more to do with the fewer opportunities to be in the Tourist Office that Torchwood afforded.

Whenever Rhys was working and Gwen felt no desire to be alone, either at home or in the Hub, she would join Jack and Ianto.  She added her stories to the Immortals to keep the Welshman amused and his smile less fake.

They had regular breaks, either because of the appearance of tourists, or to give Ianto a chance to flex his muscles and sit down.  Being still in one place was tiring work though he was able to keep it up beautifully.

Jack decided to make the walls behind Ianto a forest green and make the wood decor dark and smart.  He decided to paint a Welsh flag where the bead curtain was and there were souvenirs, leaflets and a stuffed Welsh Dragon to add to the atmosphere.

In the centre Ianto stood his arms open in welcome and a sparkling smile on his face.  He wore a black pinstripe suit, white shirt and deep red tie.

He looked welcoming, friendly, mysterious and sexy.  There was a sparkle of mischief in his eyes that some of Gwen’s ruder anecdotes had produced.

Jack would choose to hang it in the hall way so that it greeted them whenever they came home, even though it embarrassed Ianto.

One day a Torchwood related incident caused a drastic drop in people coming to Cardiff.  Jack leant the painting to the Cardiff museum and prints of it adorned Tourist Offices across Wales in the hopes of attracting visitors.

The museum took the painting with them when Wales’ first colony was established.  Jack got the shock of his life when he visited and found a holographic version of Ianto Jones, created from photos and phone conversations Welsh Tourist Board had in its records, welcoming him to the planet.

It took Jack a hundred years to leave, and only after losing another lover that he had met while staring at his painting.

 

**The Archivist**

 

‘ _The Archivist_ ’ was a painting Jack and Ianto did alone.  While Gwen had come down during the initial sketches she found the silence that dominated the atmosphere to oppressive.

She also figured out before Jack that the nervous looks Ianto was shooting there way had nothing to do with modelling nerves, and was rather the Welshman checking that they weren’t touching everything.

For her sake they therefore painted in the archives mostly when they were alone.  Jack didn’t mind the silence here as Ianto didn’t need his voice to relax.

He painted the Welshman’s grace and care, a dignified lord for order with a slight knowing smile.  It didn’t matter that the atmosphere was dark, Ianto gave it life.

When it was finished the Welshman hung it in section P of the archives.  Jack couldn’t tell if his choice was a joke, caused by modesty, or because the object being archived in the painting was, while innocent looking enough, an alien sex toy.

Ianto later packed it away while he was rearranging some things in the archives so that it wouldn’t get damaged.  Somehow the crate got mislabelled and would end up in Glasgow at Torchwood Two.

There it would be forgotten for several centuries until the Torchwood Archives were moved and the painting re-discovered.  The Archivists would look at it and decide to hang it in section P.

Over the millennia the Archive would move and change its name and change the people who ran it, but always ' _The Archivist'_ took proud place on the wall of the section where a painting would be filed.

 

_**Friends in the Park** _

 

‘ _Friends in the Park_ ’ was Ianto's favourite painting despite the fact that he was in it.  He loved it because of those that had been painted in with him.

The Welshman was sat in the centre under a tree on a blanket listening with a smile on his face.  To his right sat the Doctor telling a story with expressive hand gestures.

Jack had thought about painting his original Doctor, the one he had travelled with, known and loved, but he didn't because he knew that, if the Time Lord ever saw it, he would be deeply hurt.  So instead he painted the new model whose face wasn't bad looking.

Sitting to the Doctor's right were Rose and Martha.  To Ianto’s left were Toshiko, Owen, Gwen and Rhys.  They all looked happy, enjoying themselves as they had in Jack’s favourite memories.

After Ianto’s death Jack took down ‘ _Friends in the Park_ ’.  It hurt too much to look at knowing it was a lie, but he kept it safe and when the hurt passed he hung it back up again.

Over the millennia it was put up and taken down as Jack loved and lost.  Those that truly loved him understood the painting’s presence and the joy it brought to his home.

Every now and then someone would ask him about the people in the painting and he would say.

“They are the people who made me who I am in my early years.  That’s the Doctor and Rose, they set me on my path.  They turned a cowardly con man into a hero who faced the Dalek’s with a hand gun.

“Toshiko, Martha and Owen were true friends all brilliant heroes who made me a greater man.  They’re Gwen and Rhys, together they helped me rediscover my humanity and Ianto...”

Here always Jack would pause, always his voice would break, his eyes filled with tears he couldn’t always hold back.

“Ianto gave me wisdom, patience, and understanding.  He taught me not to be afraid of love, taught me that, despite the pain of loss, it’s worth it, it heals from beyond the grave.  He made my universe shine.”


	17. Chapter Seventeen

For Ianto Jones waking up in the morning had become the best part of the day.  Unless there had been an emergency during the night, he always woke being held by Jack.

The Immortal still wasn’t his Jack but Ianto was starting to like that.  He was tender and attentive to the Welshman’s wellbeing, more relaxed about spending every waking moment at Torchwood working.

Sure there was always something to do in the Hub, always some research or project that required attention and one day leaving them would probably bite them. 

However with just the three of them, even thought it was only just over a month since the funerals.  They were still fragile to their loss and if they had tried to do everything they would all burn out.

It didn’t matter how much Ianto liked this new Jack though, he wasn’t quite the man he loved.  The current lack sexual ability was also getting the Immortal down.

Ianto decided it was time to stop pretending to be asleep and open his eyes.

Jack’s stared into his, holding a well of hurt that he just wanted to kiss and touch and make love to him until all that hurt drained away.  Ianto didn’t, neither of them could face the pain that came if the Immortal could not respond.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“I liked your paintings by the way.  I never got a chance to say yesterday.”

Jack had chosen to unveil his latest three paintings to Ianto, Gwen and Rhys and invited them to the Hub for a little soiree.  In typical Torchwood style just as the cloth was pulled away to reveal the canvases beneath the Rift Alarm sounded.

The emergency had required all three of them and they left Rhys behind.  When they returned they were exhausted, but Gwen’s husband had ordered pizza for all as he felt hungry himself.

Jack drove Ianto back to his flat afterwards.  He was half asleep when they arrived and the Immortal stripped him put him to bed.

“Which one did you like best?”

“’ _Friends in the Park_ ’,” Ianto replied without hesitation.  “You captured Tosh perfectly, thank you.”

“You don’t mind that...”

“I know how important the Doctor and Rose are to you,” Ianto reassured and Jack smiled.  “I was thinking, it would be nice to hang it in the lounge.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“What about ‘ _The Archivist_ ’?”

“He’s going to go where he belongs in the archives.”

“And we can hang ‘ _Welcome to Wales_ ’ in the hall,” Jack announced grinning.

“Really?” Ianto asked unsure.

“I like the idea of coming home and having you greet me.”

“So the fact that you only have to say the word to find me naked and waiting isn’t enough?” Ianto asked playfully then instantly regretted it as Jack’s face fell.

“That isn’t likely to happen any time soon.”

“Jack...”

“We should...” the Immortal began moving away from him.

“Do you think the Play Room would make an excellent Studio for you?” Ianto asked hastily and Jack paused.

When the Captain took over Torchwood he’s converted the living quarters for the Torchwood Train drivers into a room dedicated to sexual pleasure.  It had gone unused until early into his relationship with Ianto.

They were both pretending to just be friends with benefits then, but Ianto agreed to let Jack film them having sex, several times.

When Jack left with the Doctor, Ianto went there to watch one of the films and to say goodbye.  Only he was discovered by a distraught Gwen who in her anger, jealousy and disappointment destroyed the room.

Gwen and Ianto sorted things out between them before Jack returned.  The Play Room remained destroyed until the Immortal and the Archivist’s relationship was more firmly established again.

Suddenly mentioning it confused Jack and made him hesitate.  That was the Welshman’s intention, so Ianto he added.

“I thought that for our more _private_ paintings my flat is a bit small and a bit far from the Hub if there’s an emergency.  The Play Room would be ideal for both.”

“You may not get the results you are hoping for,” Jack said quietly.

“That’s the beauty of art, it isn’t something that can be rushed.  It just requires the right inspiration.  Unless you feel you need to change your model.”

“No!”

“I don’t want to change my artist.”

Jack’s lips pressed into his sending tingles through him.  The Immortal’s tongue danced with his and his hands roamed freely.

When the Captain drew back it was with the wrong kind to sigh.  It was one of disappointment with himself.

Ianto touched his face and arm trying to reassure.  As Jack looked in his eyes, the Welshman hoped he was hiding his own frustration and guilt.  When the Immortal urged them to get up he knew he had failed. 

The problem was that Ianto had started to think about having sex again.

It was one of Gwen’s stories about a flasher that did it.  Ianto suddenly he had an image in his head of Jack in his greatcoat and nothing else.

Before he let his fantasy get out of hand, he looked at the Immortal painting him.  Ianto then felt guilty for thinking sexual thoughts while Jack has his problem, then guilty for thinking them while Tosh and Owen were gone.

Every night after that, when he did his slow striptease, gave Jack his good night kiss he had to hide his disappointment that there was nothing more.  Yet he wouldn’t part from lying next to the Immortal all night, waking up with him in the morning for anything.

Ianto wondered if he’d made a mistake in agreeing to this art business.  He wondered if he’d stopped being an object of Jack’s sexual desire and become one of artistic beauty to be admired and untouched.

No kisses like the ones they had shared told Ianto that Jack still wanted him, wanted more with him but couldn’t.  So for his sake, the Welshman crushed his desires, chose to remain patient.

He sincerely hoped that being painted in the nude would change all that.  Ianto always blamed his wish for nearly ruining everything.

 

 


	18. Chapter Eighteen - Blue Dragons

“When I agreed to let you paint me naked this isn’t exactly what I meant,” Ianto commented without rancour.

Jack chuckled and gave him a light slap on the arse.

“Keep still and read your book I’m trying to concentrate.”  They smiled at each other and Ianto returned to his book.

For once the Rift had sent them something that got Jack instantly excited, a Calyst Tattooing kit.  He rushed through the tests to make sure everything was safe and working then looked at Ianto wearing a huge grin.

Calyst was a human colony whose inhabitants had taken body art to new heights.  They didn’t just tattoo pictures they thought looked good or the names of loved ones but political views, their opinions and causes, their outlooks and even the latest crazes they followed were all displayed in tattoos.

That meant that some tattoos remained with them, like their opinions, for a life time while others could be so last week an hour after they were finished.  So they developed tattooing technology to cope with the two very different demands.

The tattoos were painted with special ink and a heat pad was used to fix it permanently to the skin.  Older tattoos did sometimes fade and require refreshments but the images resisted washing off.

However if you changed your mind and decided you didn’t want an image anymore then a vibration pad set at the correct frequency broke the inks down.  The tattoo would be gone in a few days when the skin renewed its cells.

They tested that Ianto wasn’t allergic and that the vibration pad worked with a single blue dot.  The Welshman hadn’t seen Jack so eager in ages and agreed to be tattooed by him even though it meant shaving off most of his body hair.

The first tattoo went around the Welshman’s left ankle.  A blue Chinese dragon flying in a circle trying to catch its tale. 

The next blue Chinese dragon, also chasing its tale, went around Ianto’s right arm.  Then Jack painted blue European dragons at rest on the outside of the Welshman’s right ankle and on the inside of his left wrist.

Ianto’s observation about being painted in the nude was prompted when Jack told him to strip off and lie on his stomach so that he could tattoo his back.  This was the one the Immortal wanted to do the most, but he forced himself to practice with the others until he was sure of his technique.

There had been several moments during their relationship where Jack had wanted to mark the Welshman’s back.  In love bites he would spell out his true initials in the language of Boeshane Peninsular to claim Ianto as his.

Now he used the tattoo ink to trace the familiar design.  Entwined with his initials he added several more blue dragons.

As Jack worked he wished he could have his own tattoo.  Ianto understood and accepted the blue dragons were Jack’s mark, the Welshman’s safe word of Dragon referred to the Immortal, and blue was his colour.

Red might be Ianto’s colour but Jack wanted a black panther for his tattoo.  That was Jack’s safe word and it referred to his wildcat Welshman.

Jack had actually tried to test the tattooing ink first however his immortal body wouldn’t let the ink hold in his skin.  He never told Ianto that the next day he’d gone to a tattoo parlour and got the big black cat tattooed on his right hip.

The Rift left Ianto too exhausted to admire Jack’s body art that night and the next morning it was gone.  The Immortal stared at himself in the mirror and found himself weeping that he couldn’t give the same sign of devotion that Ianto was giving him.

After Jack finished the tattoo on Ianto’s back he did another European dragon in flight upon his right hip.  Its partner, the last tattoo, was upon the Welshman’s left inner thigh, that was the one that caused the trouble.

Half way though painting this last dragon Jack smelt a familiar musk.  He turned his head slightly to see that the sheet Ianto was using to cover himself made a distinct tent.

Jack looked up to see Ianto focusing on his book, trying to will the erection away.  The Immortal’s intimate proximity and his emotions were making it difficult.

He chose to ignore it.  He had a tattoo to finish and Ianto was trying not to call attention to his arousal.  Yet the erection was still there as Jack applied the heating pad that would fix the tattoo into place. 

Jack hated himself because the Little Captain was still unresponsive.  He felt glad that Ianto still desired him and it pained him that he couldn’t return the compliment.

He couldn’t just leave it though.  Jack couldn’t let Ianto go away and sort himself out.  With each dragon tattoo he felt like he was staking his claim, this erection belonged to him.

Ianto was still trying to stay engrossed in his book as Jack removed the heating pad.  He carefully lifted the sheet and took a long swipe with his tongue.

The Welshman moaned and salty pre-come tasted so good.  Ianto put aside his book to look at him curiously.

It dawned on Jack that he didn’t need the little Captain to pleasure Ianto.  Perhaps this might even stir him into action.

He took Ianto’s little Archivist into his mouth.  The Welshman moaned again and Jack remembered how much he loved that sound.

Jack worked slowly, sucking the shaft when teasing the Welshman’s balls.  He loved the taste, loved the sounds spilling out of Ianto, just for him.

The Immortal worked at teasing every moment of pleasure into Ianto.  As he felt the Welshman coming close to climax he swallowed him again.

He let Ianto’s hip buck freely as he lost control and Ianto’s cock thrust wildly into his mouth.  Jack himself felt joy at being able to do this even if the little Captain remained still.

As the Welshman came he swallowed down every drop, loving the taste, smell and feel of the climax.  In that moment Jack knew Ianto was his still.

Ianto collapsed backwards onto the bed with a huge smile on his face.  Jack couldn’t help leaning over him, kissing him deeply so that he could taste himself.

Jack was so caught up in his feeling of triumph that he’d found a way to please Into, that he didn’t notice where the Welshman’s hands were wandering. 

Ianto froze seconds before Jack realised the Welshman was touching his limp cock.

The pleasure on the young man’s face turned instantly to horror.  Seconds later he pushed Jack off of him and was scrambling from the bed.

“How could you?  I didn’t... how could you?” the Welshman stammered.

“Ianto...” he began moving towards the now distraught young man.

The Welshman hesitated only long enough to snatch up his bath robe before turning and running away.

Jack stayed there on the bed unable to fathom what he’d done wrong.

 


	19. Chapter Nineteen

Gwen Cooper knew something was wrong the instant she stepped into the Hub.  Jack dashed from his desk as she entered but didn’t smile at her when he saw her.

There was no scent of coffee in the air and the disappointment in Jack’s eyes told her that he’d been expecting Ianto.  Any irritation she might have felt because of his reaction to her was suppressed by instant worry.

“Where’s Ianto?” she asked.

“He’s got the day off.  He needed a break.”  The ‘ _from me_ ’ was unspoken but implied as though he’d shouted it.

Gwen felt even more worry at this.  There’d been no huge Torchwood tragedy to upset Ianto, not since they lost Tosh and Owen.

Ianto was a dedicated workaholic.  He didn’t request days off even when he really needed them.  It took Jack’s command sometimes to get him to rest.

If it had been a personal emergency then Jack would have said, and he would not have looked this anxious and unhappy.  That meant the Immortal had done something to upset him, something he was sorry for.

“Do you want me to get us something from Starbucks?” she asked.

“No don’t go to any trouble for me.”

“I have some instant coffee.”

“Sounds great, I’ll be in my office.”

_Yep he’s definitely done something to upset Ianto.  Doesn’t want to upset him further by having an illicit Starbucks and is willing to suffer the punishment of my instant coffee._

_Oh and they were doing so well.  Ianto has a Saint’s patience and a whore’s willingness when it comes to Jack, so whatever he’s done it must be big._

_It’s also going to be personal.  Jack never shares anything about Ianto unless it’s concern for his welfare._

Gwen made her way up to the kitchen to make an instant coffee that she would never dare make if Ianto was around.  Given that the Welshman was a caffeine god, instant coffee could only be viewed as the work of the devil.

She took it along to Jack and put it on his desk.  He said thank you but didn’t look up from the mountain of paperwork he seemed to be hiding behind.

His sketch pad was also nowhere in sight.  Jack wasn’t ever seen without his sketch pad these days unless he was driving or on a mission.

Gwen had made the guess a few days ago that they had begun to work on some form of erotic art.  They weren’t setting up the easel anywhere in the Hub and they were eager for her to go home early every night.

While she was aware of Ianto’s incredible modesty, he could barely look at the paintings of himself fully dressed, she knew how beautifully Jack painted.

She didn’t think that their erotic picture could be horribly ugly, especially as it was one subject Gwen expected Jack to be an expert at.  So what had gone wrong?

 _Jack probably tried it on and Ianto isn’t ready._  

Never for a moment did she think Jack would force himself on anyone, but he could be over-eager with his persuasions.  Given their recent loss any sexual overtures might make the Welshman extremely uncomfortable.

Gwen felt a little helpless.  She couldn’t talk to either man about what had happened as she knew they would both clam up.

Even when the whole team knew Jack and Ianto were at it they were very private about their relationship.  It was only the way that they both seemed so much happier, the occasional looks, touches and kisses, the way Ianto could calm or encourage Jack and of course catching them together in the hot house, that spoke of how strong that relationship was.

She couldn’t offer either of them any comfort.  If she consoled Jack, Ianto would withdraw from them both and if she consoled Ianto it would hurt Jack’s feelings.

Reluctantly Gwen decided to get on with some of her own reports.  She might not be able help directly but at least it would help easy Ianto’s burden, which is what Jack seemed intent on doing.

_Perhaps this break will be good for them.  After all they’ve been with each other practically twenty-four seven since Ianto collapsed from exhaustion._

Gwen worked all day feeling miserable.  Jack didn’t stir from his office and there was no Ianto to talk to.

She hadn’t felt this isolated since the night she chose to tell Rhys about her affair with Owen and retconned afterwards him so he wouldn’t remember.  She hated the feeling then, but at least she’d known she’d deserved it, after all that had been her fault.

When the time came for her to go she hated having to leave Jack alone but her staying, her favouritism could only make things worse.  Gwen however promised herself that although she would give the two of them time, she wasn’t going to give them too much of it.

When she arrived home to Rhys, she’d never been more pleased to see him and hear about his work colleagues.  Gwen made love to her husband that night and hoped he understood how much he meant to her.


	20. Chapter Twenty

Ianto Jones didn’t want to go into work but Jack had promised Gwen the evening off to see friends who were visiting Cardiff so he made the effort.

The Welshman felt awful.  Food didn’t interest him.  He’d just spent the previous day watching TV and the night being unable to sleep.

He missed Jack, wanted Jack, ached for him all over, but he didn’t deserve Jack.  It didn’t help that all he had to do was look at himself and see the claim the Immortal had placed on him, wretch that he was.

Ianto had tried so hard not to be aroused while Jack painted him with dragons.  The Immortal had been so keen, so excited and while it meant being closer than he intended in his bid to arouse Jack, the Welshman had no heart to crush him.

He couldn’t help it though.  The feel of Jack’s brush tickled, his proximity, not to mention that he did choose some sensitive areas to paint.

The inner thigh was said to be one of the most intimate places to get a tattoo.  It meant the art was for ones lover alone.

All his dragons he wore for Jack.  Ianto knew he couldn’t keep them, the dangers of Torchwood meant that he shouldn’t have any identifying marks and he hated that.

Ianto had intended to ask Jack to photograph them.  He would never presume that the Immortal would want to paint him in his tattoos but he would have liked photographs to help him remember.

How he couldn’t ask.  Now each of them reminded Ianto of what he did, reminded him of his selfishness.

Why did he have to start thinking about sex?  He’d been perfectly content to be celibate before when Lisa had her tragedies and wasn’t in the mood.

True Jack tended to prefer to turn to pleasure when he was hurt.  He liked to lose himself and Ianto had always been willing to be the one the Immortal got lost in.

Now trauma had prevented Jack from doing his thing and Ianto had become obsessed.  That erection should never have stayed, he should have willed it away before the Immortal even noticed.

He hadn’t expected the swipe of Jack’s tongue, hadn’t expected to be swallowed, sucked and teased.

There had been such desire in the Immortal’s eyes as he moved along Ianto’s shaft.  For the few moments before pleasure became overwhelming, the Welshman had thought that he’d done it, that he’d gotten his Jack back.

Discovering the truth was like being stabbed in the heart.

Sure Ianto had become increasingly horny but he wanted Jack to be horny with him.  He couldn’t help feeling like he had forced the Immortal to service him out of fear, in case not doing so would lose him.

He feared to return because he knew Jack wouldn’t be able to look at him.  He would have realised how appalling Ianto was and want nothing to do with him.

When he entered the Hub the last thing he expected was Jack’s eagerly rushing to greet him.  They didn’t speak, didn’t touch, didn’t kiss but the Immortal had obviously run from his office to the door and was just staring at him.

They both stared at each other.  They both wanted to go to the other, to apologise, to tell the other it would be alright.  They wanted to touch, they wanted to kiss. 

They didn’t want to make another mistake, they didn’t want to be alone another night.  They were both afraid to speak in case they ruined everything.

They stayed there staring at each other until Gwen arrived.  Then Ianto made his way to the kitchen to get coffee before heading down to the archives.

Jack smiled at Gwen this morning as he greeted her then retreated back to his office.  There was still more admin to do and he was going to do it.

The surprise and guilt on Ianto’s face were enough to tell Jack what he’d done wrong.  He may have shouted at the Immortal yesterday but the Welshman blamed himself, felt guilty for something he had no need to feel guilty for.

He should have let Ianto take care of himself or he should have asked permission. 

It was obvious now that the Welshman was aware of the Little Captain’s problem so all he had to do was ask permission.  Ianto would have checked to see if Jack was aroused himself, he would have said no but that he would like to give this a try and everything would have been fine, disappointing to him but at least Ianto wouldn’t feel like he had abused him.

He could tell Ianto was down in the archives now brooding over what had happened.  Perhaps he could think his way through this because Jack couldn’t see how he could let the Welshman know how he felt.

In typical Torchwood style they received an alert of three Weevils on the loose half an hour after Gwen left.  Both members of his team would never forgive him if he called the ex-PC back in to go with him instead of Ianto.

So reluctantly Jack took the young man with him.  As expected the Welshman wore his professional mask, all efficiency and focus.

Jack had to remind himself that he had to be on alert and not watching out for Ianto.  Dying on the Welshman now might be the last straw.

Unexpectedly the first two were caught without problem.  It was like old times, the team work, the adrenaline, the familiar aliens it was almost fun.

Then the third appeared out of nowhere.  It headed straight for Ianto and Jack tackled it away.

In that instant Jack saw red, anger and protectiveness took over and it wasn’t until he was aware of the Welshman’s arms around him, pulling him away that he realised he’d beaten the last Weevil to a pulp.

Ianto dragged Jack back to the SUV, cleaned up his hands and belted him in the passenger seat.  The Immortal just stared at his hands not quite believing what he’d done.

He had no awareness of Ianto loading the aliens into the car and driving them back to the Hub.   No awareness of the Weevils being taken out of the SUV and interred in either cells or the morgue.

The next thing he knew he was being lowered into warm scented water.  He was in Ianto’s bathroom and the Welshman was reading the Hobbit to him.

Tears began to flow then.  His feelings for Ianto overwhelming him, he was being choked by the undeserved kindness that poured out of the Welshman.

As soon as Ianto realised Jack was crying, he put the book down and went to him.  He held the Immortal as he wept whispering consoling words.

When Jack calmed Ianto reached for the book again.  He read another chapter until the bath water turned cold.

Ianto dried him and lead him to the bedroom and Jack stopped him.

“I shouldn’t stay.  I don’t want to hurt you any further.”

“Nothing ever hurts worse than you leaving but if you must,” Ianto replied turning away.  Jack could see the unworthiness reeking from him.

“Getting this wrong, getting us wrong will hurt worse.  I know you’re trying to heal me and you are the only reason I am.  But every time I hurt you I feel gouged out again.  I want to be with you tonight and every night more than anything but I can’t keep messing up your life like this.  All I ever do is bring hurt and pain to those I care about.  I hoped so much with you that it would be different, that I could get this right for once but I don’t seem to be capable of that.  I should have known better, I’m a curse, I’m wrong,” the Immortal finished babbling.

“Will you shut up for once in your life and stop talking bollocks,” Ianto commanded.

Jack looked up stunned to see the Welshman had turned to face him.  The anger in Ianto’s face softened but his next words were no less commanding.

“Good, now get into bed, on your side, facing the other way.”

Jack felt confused but he didn’t resist the commands.  He felt the bed dip behind him and Ianto’s arm snake under him as the Welshman muttered.

“Stupid idiotic immortals.”

Ianto spooned Jack to his chest, his left hand over the Immortal’s heart and his right running over his body soothingly.

“I once made you a promise that you would always have my company in bed, every night, whenever you needed it.

“There are times, like last night, when you don’t demand that I fulfil my promise for very good reasons.  I am grateful to you for that, even if I regret it sometimes.

“There are other occasions like tonight when, regardless how I feel about you, you need me to fulfil my promise and I always will for one very good reason.”

Jack lay there stunned.  He hadn’t said the words but Jack knew Ianto’s meaning.

“I don’t deserve you.  You could do so much better.”

“Well you know what I’m like.  Once I’ve made up my mind about something I’m very stubborn about changing it.”

“I don’t want you to change your mind.”

“Good,” Ianto answered with finality about the subject and pressed a kiss into Jack’s shoulder.

“Now go to sleep.”

Jack relaxed and leaned back.  Wrapped up in Ianto’s arms, warmth, protection and love he did just that.


	21. Chapter Twenty-one - The Changes in Men

Jack woke the next day feeling better than he had since they lost Tosh and Owen.  He didn’t want to get up, he wanted to stay in bed being held by Ianto forever.

Duty however was an unforgiving mistress and sent them a Rift Alert to remind them.  It was only an Evaritan book, but Jack didn’t like it for getting him out of bed.

The whole day Ianto seemed distracted and Jack hoped he hadn’t done anything new wrong to upset him.  After Gwen left, the Welshman disappeared, but he sent the Immortal a text to come and find him.

Jack discovered Ianto in their Play Room studio.  He was wearing an old t-shirt and jeans, the dragons on his arm could just be seen and his fingers were covered in paint.

In front of him was a canvas covered in smears of paint.  Jack could see a pattern in the colours but the subject matter was unclear to him.

As he approached Ianto sprayed the canvas with water to keep the paints damp and malleable.  The Welshman turned as Jack came up to him and gave him a brief, sad smile.

“So what are you painting?” the Immortal asked curious as Ianto hadn’t shown any inclination towards painting himself since Jack had asked to paint him.

“‘ _The Changes in Men_ ’,” Ianto replied and turned back to his painting.

“There are two boys, the two brown cores, too them comes nutrition, water, shelter, the needs of the flesh in green making them grow but that does not make them men.

“Added to that is learning, facts, figures, observation, the blue.  Knowledge helps them to grow in mind but that does not make them men.

“The both boys have family who love and care for them, nurture them and friends to play with and they help the two to grow emotionally, feelings from love to jealousy, anger, sadness and lust, the red paint.

“They are growing but still not men when disaster strikes, the dark Gray.  The boy on the right is fortunate, he survives physically unharmed but never forgets the disaster.

“It helps to shape his actions as he continues to grow, experiences more things, makes new friends, finds love.  With time he has become a man, with a man’s blend of splendour and darkness, and he chooses to make a difference, for good, because he survived.”

The shape on the left was a swirl of colours, all bright shades making it large.  Red and yellow dominated making that one stand out and look beautiful, perhaps because there were also darker streaks within it.

“And the boy on the right?” Jack asked his voice cracking.

“He was not fortunate.  He is ripped away from his family and friends, physically and mentally tormented.

“See the red of his childhood experiences of love turns to black hatred as his humanity is ripped out of him piece by piece,” Ianto said his nails gouging into the paint leaving dark trails behind.

“He may have still grown to adulthood, still learnt but emotionally he is still a child, he doesn’t understand the complexity of feeling and cold hate dominates all, even anger, making him dangerous.”

“Is there no hope for him?” Jack asked staring at the darker, tormented figure.

“I cannot say.  If a spark of humanity remains hidden within then perhaps.  It would take someone with a great deal of love, a great deal of patience and time to discover it,” Ianto replied.

“Could he do it?” Jack asked indicating the shining mass of colours on the left.

Ianto dipped his fingers in black paint.  He smeared it in a path from the figure on the right to the one on the left.

“The Tragic Child in his hate injured the Fortunate Man,” Ianto wiped his fingers and reached for an indigo colour.

“He caused great sorrow and grief, enough to destroy part of the life the Fortunate Man had built for himself, enough to shake his fundamental sense of self, to bring him to a point where he could change, but that change is not yet decided”.

The bright shape was now dimmed by the indigo whirling around it.  It no longer represented a good man filled with purpose and hope but one deep in despair.

“No, as he is now he can not save the Tragic Child,” Ianto said with sad finality and Jack hung his head.

“But there is hope,” Ianto added softly and picked up the red and yellow again.

“Men rarely stand alone in life.  They surround themselves with others and they care for each other.

“The Fortunate Man has others to look after and he is trying too hard to look after them.  It’s good that he’s protective, but he is trying to do things he isn’t ready for, mutual tasks that can wait.

 “Just as the Tragic Child needs love and patience, the Fortunate Man needs them too so that he can overcome his grief, so that he can rediscover himself or change and grow into someone new.”

With that he added red and yellow swirls to the shape on the left.  It was not restored to its former glory but it began to look beautiful again.

“With time, care and patience this man may be healed, he will be able to do those things he isn’t ready for; and he may, in time, become strong enough to give the Tragic Child what he needs to find his humanity again.”

With that Ianto stepped away from the painting and looked at Jack.  The Immortal crossed the distance between them and enveloped the Welshman with his arms.

Jack pressed his lips to the Welshman’s as Ianto brought his fingers to the Immortal’s face leaving them marked with streaks of red and yellow.

Wise and patient Ianto, Jack knew he was surviving, healing because of him.  He wished he didn’t need more time but the love in their embrace told him that he had it.

It was an ironic moment.

Jack’s mistake of giving Ianto a blow job after tattooing him meant that sex was now the last thing the Welshman wanted.  He was offering comfort and healing as he did last night, despite being deeply hurt.

It was an ironic moment because, like last night, Ianto’s words penetrated deep within Jack and some of the powerful fears that held him let go. 

As he drew back from the kiss to look at his beautiful, paint streaked Welshman with sorrowful blue eyes, Jack felt the Little Captain twitch.

Now though was not the time to pursue this breakthrough.  If he did, he would drive Ianto away, make the Welshman feel like he had pushed again and Jack couldn’t risk that.

He couldn’t see the red and yellow paint on his face that had made the Fortunate Man glorious.  Yet Jack felt that he, like the painting, had been touched by hope, the gift of Ianto Jones he would treasure.

Jack took Ianto away to clean up and then go out for dinner.  Although he knew he had to wait before seeing if the Little Captain was ready to do his stuff again, he wasn’t going to spend another night apart from the Welshman.

The next day while Ianto was occupied the Immortal hid the painting.  He wanted to make sure it didn’t disappear, the Welshman wouldn’t think it worth keeping as his own work, and yet it instantly meant so much to Jack.

 

Many years after the death of Ianto Jones, when he was ready to settle in one place again with his own house Jack retrieved the painting and hung it up.  Whenever he felt down or low he would look at the shape on the left, feel the red and gold strengthen him with the memories of his lover they invoked.

When the painting was stolen, Jack was devastated.  He searched decades before accepting that he’d lost Ianto’s painting of himself and Gray.

Then unexpectedly, many centuries later, it turned up at an auction.  Jack was quite a rich man but the final price was twice what he could afford.

The man who bought it, Petre Zeoth, had so much wealth he barely noticed the dent in his finances.  So Jack did something he never thought he would do, he set out to seduce a rich man for his painting.

When less than a year later, the Immortal accepted Petre’s proposal of marriage, he could feel Ianto and his painting smiling in blessing at him, because without intending to Jack had found love again.


	22. Chapter Twenty-two – Relaxing at Home and Property of the Artist

**Relaxing at Home**

 

All Jack wanted to do was paint Ianto in the nude.  He knew the Little Captain’s twitch wasn’t a fluke and painting the Welshman naked would prove that.

Ianto however had stopped his slow stripteases and the lingering kisses before he curled up against Jack’s body each night.

That only confirmed what Jack knew.  He’d taken several steps forward in healing after the losses Gray had inflicted on them, but only after forcing Ianto to take a few steps back.

Jack knew he was the one who was going to have to broach the subject with Ianto.  He was going to have to ask this time, but he knew it was too soon.

So he decided that another fully dressed portrait was needed.

However he didn’t want to do another one at work.  Gwen heartily approved as that meant early nights for all of them.

There were two other advantages.  The first was that they could eat before they started and go to bed when they finished.  The second was that Ianto didn’t mind wearing the same outfit so much if there was only Jack to see it.

For ‘ _Relaxing at Home_ ’ Ianto’s feet were bare and curled up on the sofa beside him.  He wore jeans and a red buttoned t-shirt with a white collar.

Ianto read while Jack painted, getting through a few books.  That didn’t matter as, to the Immortal, the man in the painting could read only one book, the Hobbit.

Several months later, when Jack had to go away to help on an important top secret project without his team, and with no communications, he found a sealed envelope amongst his things labelled ‘Operation Panther’.

Inside there was a photograph of ‘ _Relaxing at Home_ ’ and several pornographic pictures of Ianto.  There was also an MP3 player with a verbal brief of what Ianto knew of the top secret project, words of advice and encouragement, the Welshman reading the first four chapters of the Hobbit and several recordings to accompany the other photos.

After Ianto died Jack took the photo of ‘ _Relaxing at Home_ ’ with him as well as some of the MP3 recordings the Welshman had made for him.  He wasn’t ready to listen to the one his lover left posthumously telling the Immortal how he felt about him and what he hoped for his future.

Instead he would stare at the photo of ‘ _Relaxing at_ Home’ and listen to him reading the Hobbit.  After he returned from his travelling he would stare at the painting instead and listen to Ianto reading even after he had memorised every word, tone and inflection.

Centuries later one of his jealous lovers gave ‘ _Relaxing at Home_ ’ away to a children’s charity for them to auction.  He dumped her immediately, feeling grateful that she only ever had access to that one painting, and bid on it at to try and get back, but lost it.

His consolation was knowing that Ianto would have wanted the charity to have the money.

For over a millennium ‘ _Relaxing at Home_ ’ passed through private hands until it became the property of the Lux family.  If the Doctor had visited the Twentieth Century Children’s Literature section of the great library where the Vashta Nerada live, he would have seen it on display.

As it was while the Time Lord and River Song rescued the survivors, nobody noticed Jack teleport in and steal the painting back.

When he returned to his wife she saw it, slapped him and then kissed him.

“Idiot you’re late home and you’re meant to be reading Chapter Six tonight, off with you.”

Jack kissed her then went to their children to continue the story of Bilbo Baggin’s adventures while she found a place to hang the painting.

 

**Property of the Artist**

 

Jack’s resolve about waiting for Ianto to be ready lasted six days.  He found he couldn’t actually ask what he wanted so instead he just took the Welshman to the play room where he had set up his easel.

Ianto looked at him, checked to make sure he was ready for this, then stripped off.  He slipped on the bed and sat with his back facing Jack and looked to him to see if the pose was okay.

It wasn’t the full frontal the Immortal had been half hoping for, but it was probably just as well for them to take this slowly.

“Perfect,” was all he said before activating the remote and the sounds of the James Bond theme tune announced that Doctor No was playing on the screens around them.

Jack hadn’t had the opportunity to really look at the tattoo on Ianto’s back before.  He never realised how erotic his initials and the dragons could be.

He was focused on the beauty and didn’t realise until afterwards that Ianto had turned his head so that it was captured in profile, looking over his shoulder.

Then the slightly delayed unveiling took place, Ianto asked what the symbol on his back meant.  Shyly Jack confessed it to be his initials, his true initials in the language of his birth.

He thought Ianto would be angry.  He’d basically claimed the Welshman as his property without permission.

Instead Ianto smiled.

“What?” Jack asked confused.

“You understand the balance of power in a dominant/submissive relationship,” the Welshman replied.

“Of course while the dominant has the appearance of power all the control lies with the submissive.”

Ianto smiled at him again and returned his attention to the painting.

It took a few seconds for Jack to realise what he meant.  While he’d marked Ianto as his property, he hadn’t written ‘Captain Jack Harkness’.

Ianto might not know his true name, and never asked for it, but Jack had given him his initials, a piece of him that no other had and with them showed the world the Welshman’s claim upon him.

 

Years later ‘ _Property of the Artist_ ’ would be one of the paintings stolen from Jack.  He never saw it again but he had photos to remember it by.

‘ _Property of the Artist_ ’ eventually ended up on a colony ship as one of the artefacts kept secure to give a cultural legacy to the colonist’s children, but while it was put on display, it was soon all but forgotten.

Then one night a young couple feeling reckless snuck into the area of the colony where the cultural artefacts were kept.  As soon as they saw ‘ _Property of the Artist_ ’ they were spellbound by it, not least because, despite the painting’s age, upon the back of the man in the picture were letters in their language.

As they stared at it they made up stories about the man with the back tattoo, each one becoming more erotic.  Their words were accompanied by touches and kisses and soon they forgot themselves and were making love before it.

Seven months later, when the baby conceived that night began kicking, the woman complained, “You are going to be a right little dragon.”

She then looked at her husband, remembering the painting, and they both smiled.  When their first son was born they made sure he had the same initials as those they had seen in the painting he’d been conceived by.

 


	23. Chapter Twenty-three

_The Rift is a Bitch_ , Jack concluded as, in the fraction of a second between the last stroke of paint on ‘ _Property of the Artist_ ’ and his stepping back to admire his work, an alert sounded.

_It’s so unfair.  The Little Captain is finally giving Ianto the hard on he deserves and now that fabulous body is scrambling to find clothes to serve his mistress._

Jack waited until he was rushing back to the main Hub and out of Ianto’s earshot before he let out a frustrated growl.  He had known after the Welshman’s slightly slower than usual strip that tonight was the night, and now this.

He checked the readings.  Not a large enough spike for an alien which meant an object, one which was emitting energy readings.

Ianto appeared behind him, took a look at the readings and headed for the SUV without being ordered to or asked.

Since the night the Welshman told him to shut up and stop talking bullocks, he had become much more assertive.  There was no staying behind anymore unless Ianto felt like it.

_You would never think I’m over a hundred and fifty years old the way he’s been treating me lately.  It’s as if he doesn’t think I’m safe to be left on my own anymore._

Jack couldn’t explain to anyone why that thought made him smile.

He got in the driver’s seat of the SUV and headed towards Bute Town.  Ianto studied his PDA dressed so immaculately that you wouldn’t think that less than ten minutes go he’d been deliciously naked.

They followed the readings that lead them to a house in a quiet street.  The house was dark which was unusual because it was barely nine.

“The house belonged to a Mrs. Bronwyn Thomas.  She died suddenly last week, heart attack while out shopping.  Her only living relative is a niece who lives in New Zealand and hasn’t had the chance to get here,” Ianto informed him reading from his PDA.

Jack nodded and stepped aside for Ianto to pick open the lock.  Despite being the readings suggesting it was only an object, they entered with their guns raised.

The Immortal made Ianto wait in the hall while he gave the upstairs the all clear.  They then moved into the lounge and from there Jack crossed to the kitchen.

After Jack gave him the nod, the Welshman turned the light on.  The readings were definitely coming from the lounge and it took them a few moments to locate it.

There sat in the middle of the coffee table like an ornament, was what looked like a blue-grey vase with a balloon stuck in it instead of flowers.  They both looked at each other from opposite sides as if to ask _is that it_?

Without warning the energy readings changed.  The balloon began to expand.

“Ianto...” Jack called too late as suddenly there was light and a loud bang and he was coated in something warm and wet.

The Immortal froze in fear, terrified to open his eyes and confirm what he was covered in.  Then he heard a depressed Welsh groan and they flew open.

“Well that’s another suit ruined,” Ianto complained trying to wipe the blue slime he was drenched in away from his face.

Jack walked through the ruined coffee table and was kissing him in seconds.  Ianto responded with equal passion until the Immortal began to slip his jacket off.

He grabbed one of the Welshman’s hands and directed it to the Little Captain.  A tingling sensation ran through Jack as Ianto stroked him before realising what it was he was touching. 

Then he was scrambling at the Immortal’s clothing.  Already ruined by the slime neither cared that they ripped as well.

Swiftly they were naked and Jack pushed Ianto onto the slime covered sofa.  No protests were formed as his mouth and hands moved skittishly over the Welshman’s body unable to decide what to pleasure first.

He raked his hand into the nearest lube available, the blue alien slime.  Jack barely had enough reasoning to know that if it wasn’t tingling it wasn’t going to harm them.

He pushed a finger into Ianto’s tight channel and received a glorious moan.  Jack opened the Welshman swiftly as each sound he made threatened to make him come instantly.

Soon he was pushing inside and Ianto cried out for more.  They were thrusting fast and hard and Jack stroked the Welshman until they came together.

In the afterglow they just stared at each other, touched each other kissed each other.  Jack hadn’t withdrawn from Ianto and was soon hard again and moving inside him.

After they came for the second time Jack knew that Ianto wouldn’t stand laying in the blue slime any longer and reluctantly withdrew.  Hand in hand they went to the bathroom to shower.

Despite the need to wash away the slime there hands were more interested in touching the other’s skin than getting clean.  They were soon rutting up against each other without any pretence as washing.

It had been so long for Jack.  Any attempt by the Immortal to take things slowly was forgotten as soon as Ianto moaned, or sighed, or made any one of a hundred erotic noises at the simplest of touches.

For Ianto to a floodgate had opened.  As soon as he realised Jack was hard the first time he stopped thinking of anything but giving the Immortal all the pleasure he could.

They were both uncontrollable.  As soon as they were clean and out of the shower they were hardening as they towelled each other down.

They made for the bedroom and Ianto gave Jack a look that had him making for the bed.  The Welshman went to the dresser and returned with some cream and a ribbon.

Jack watched with curiosity as the Welshman used the ribbon to make a cock ring.  He had no desire to play games but the Welshman had a mischievous smile that said he had wicked plans for the Little Captain.

He had wicked plans for the rest of Jack too.

Ianto made the Immortal hold his hands above his head then moved over Jack’s body, kissing, biting, sucking and scratching.  It took all the Immortal’s self-control not to reach out and touch.

_Only Ianto has ever been able to do this to me.  Only he can touch me in the way I want, touch me the way I need and still make me feel like I'm being teased._

No sooner did Jack have this thought then Ianto took him in his mouth.  The noise he produced was obscene and equalled only the ones that escaped the Immortal’s lips as he felt a finger requesting entrance to his hole.

Ianto teased Jack’s cock with his lips and his prostate with his fingers.  He wanted to come again but the improvised cock ring thwarted him.

The Welshman knew exactly how crazy he was driving Jack when he withdrew his fingers and replaced them with his cock.  The Immortal closed his eyes feeling fulfilled for the first time since he was buried.

Yet Ianto wasn’t moving.  Jack opened his eyes and saw that the Welshman was waiting to have his full attention.

One of his hands was removed from Ianto’s body and guided to something slightly wet and slimy.  He realised it was the cream only as his hand was directed to the Welshman’s entrance.

Ianto was still open from their earlier love making and it seemed it was the job of Jack’s fingers to keep him that way.  Then he knew exactly how the Welshman wanted the night to end and couldn’t help feeling a flood of affection.

The young man leaned down and kissed him, gently, sensually and just as it was about to end the Welshman began to thrust.  Ianto was taking things slowly, teasing his whole body with almost sedate movements.

Jack couldn’t allow that.  He wanted more and he wanted it now.  So he worked those fingers inside Ianto and the Welshman’s pace soon quickened erratically.

“Jack,” he cried as he came hard inside the Immortal. 

Ianto’s eyes were drooping.  Four orgasms after nearly two months of celibacy were exacting their price, but the Welshman wasn’t a man to leave a hard cock unfulfilled.

With a chaste kiss he withdrew from Jack before the aftershocks had calmed.  The Immortal immediately turned Ianto on his side.

Jack paused to let a hand trace the initials he tattooed on the Welshman’s back.  Ianto gave a soft growl that said the Immortal wasn’t there to admire his artwork.

He thrust swiftly with no finesse, he only wanted to spill inside the Welshman but forgot about the cock ring.  Ianto reached back and untied the ribbon.  Jack came hard screaming Ianto’s name.

A warm darkness washed over Jack and the last thing he remembered was pulling Ianto closer to him.


	24. Chapter Twenty-four

Ianto felt someone standing over him and opened his eyes.  Gwen was looking down at him with an expression caught between amusement, interest and irritation.

She raised an eyebrow making him extremely aware that not only was Jack naked in the bed behind him but was still inside him.

A number of options passed through his mind but when he opened his mouth he said.

“Do you mind giving us about twenty minutes, it’s hard to get Jack up sometimes?”

Ianto sincerely hoped that she couldn’t tell how much of a lie that was.  Jack was both hard and very much up.

“Oh and be careful of the blue slime, it contains a powerful aphrodisiac.  We got coated in it last night.”

“That explains the ripped up clothes downstairs.  When I realised you were sleeping normally I figured you probably needed the rest so I covered you up then went back to the Hub and got some clothes for you both. 

“I will collect some samples now and meet you back at base,” Gwen said quickly.

Ianto could tell she was deliberately trying not mention the evidence that they’d had sex in the slime, the bathroom and a stranger’s bed.  She was also not looking at Jack, who felt to Ianto like he was having a sex dream.  Trying not to react to a cock teasing your prostate is very difficult without a hand moving towards your own.

“Good luck,” she said huskily and fled rapidly.

“Thank god I thought she’d never leave,” Jack muttered clamping his mouth on Ianto’s shoulder to make a love bite while withdrawing and thrusting in.

“Jack...” Ianto’s protests were silenced by the Immortal turning his head around and capturing his mouth for a kiss.

The urgent passion of the previous night was gone.  Jack moved slowly prolonging every brush of Ianto’s prostate.  The hand on his cock moved with the same agonising rhythm that teased and didn’t give enough friction. 

Part of Ianto wanted Jack to move damn it, but the Welshman kept that part firmly in the minority.

Ianto never told Jack, but during their slow love-making, unless the Immortal had driven him wild with unspent passion, he always felt like it was more than just his body that was being touched.

He couldn’t tell if it was a sensation caused by his lost psychic ability, but times like this it almost felt as if Jack was trying to make love to his soul, like he was trying to caress his emotions and mind with every gentle stroke and thrust.

Afterwards Ianto always felt the notion was ridiculous, the imaginings of his heart’s desire.

Ianto knew Jack didn’t love him.  He didn’t believe the Immortal incapable or that he wasn’t trying.  It was just that over a hundred and fifty years of being afraid to love, afraid because you know you will outlive your lover, and the pain that brings, wasn’t something a simple Welshman could overcome in less than two years of dating.

That though was a thought for afterwards.  In the moment there was only Jack and how he felt, how he made Ianto feel about himself, about the universe.

Towards the end Jack quickened the pace.  His thrusts became quicker, his strokes of Ianto’s cock harder.

They came together and to Ianto it wasn’t just physical ecstasy it was emotional.

When Jack gently pulled out of him, he felt slightly abandoned.  Yet that sensation passed as the Immortal turned him and kissed him.

The afterglow faded ten minutes before reality reasserted its presence.  Ianto remembered they were in the house of a late octogenarian and Gwen was waiting at the Hub for them.

“What?” Jack asked with slight concern as he saw the change in the Welshman.

“Reality,” Ianto replied then added. “We’re in a strange house after a fantastic night but I have to clear up the mess before the niece arrives and Gwen had to bring us clothes and she knows exactly what we did last night, and just now and...”

“Good,” Jack interrupted.

“What do you mean good?”

“If she knows what we’ve been up to this morning then it won’t matter if we’re a little later.”

“Jack...” his protest was silenced by a kiss, by Jack moving so that he was above the Welshman.

Ianto moved his legs automatically, ready to greet his lover’s cock with the warm welcoming embrace of his hole.  Jack pushed gently inside and he closed his eyes blissfully.

Jack’s recovery time surprised him, but just because he wasn’t ready yet, didn’t mean Ianto would deny him.  Besides he didn’t care so much about reality when he had the Immortal’s full attention.

The Captain however didn’t move.  Instead he chuckled so Ianto opened his eyes to glare at him.

That got another chuckle and then a deep kiss.  He felt it setting his whole body afire and knew it wouldn’t be long before he was hard again.

Jack moved just as slowly as he had before.  His eyes stared into Ianto’s, and though his body felt the waves of pleasure the Immortal pushed into him, his heart was once more feeling something else.

When the Immortal lowered his head to kiss or suck at Ianto’s torso the Welshman had the feeling he was being savoured.  As though Jack was memorising and re-cataloguing every inch of him to make sure he still knew what he liked.

As they both came, Ianto felt ecstasy mixed with disappointment.  He didn’t want this to be over, he wanted the universe to be just Jack and him.

Jack withdrew from him but didn’t get up.  Instead he remained lying on top of Ianto his head on the Welshman’s shoulder.

Ianto held his lover close, stroking him, reassuring him, despite not knowing the reason why.  He didn’t think Jack felt the same way he did but there were a hundred different things in reality to upset him.

Uncomfortably full bladders forced them both to move.  They showered together, a chaste shower this time and changed into the clothes Gwen brought them.

Ianto then changed the bed and put the sheets the washing machine to be washed.  Jack mournfully picked up his slime covered great coat.

“Put it in a carrier bag I will see what I can do for it,” Ianto told him and Jack smiled.

Together they carefully cleaned up what they could of the mess and finally decided that they might as well replace everything.  Ianto knew the right people to sort it all out for them and they headed back to the Hub to face the music.


	25. Chapter Twenty-five

Gwen stared at the switched off monitor and practiced her stern face.  She didn’t want the thrill of remembering why she was commando under her jeans to betray the fact that she didn’t really have the moral high ground over Jack and Ianto.

She had no intention of lording it over them for long, especially if it upset one of them but they kind of deserved a little dig for the panic and worry they put her through this morning.

Gwen had arrived at the Hub slightly early for once.  Ianto had invited her and Rhys to his house for dinner so that Jack could unveil the latest painting they had done at home, so she wanted to make a head start so as not to be delayed tonight.

She was surprised to find the Hub deserted and all the equipment on.  The only reason for that would be if they had hurried out on a mission.

The ex-PC went straight to Tosh’s computer and found the alert.  She checked the readings, probably a small object with a strange energy signature that had now stopped.

The alert had been last night so why weren’t Jack and Ianto back.  Her time at Torchwood had taught her never to underestimate the power in a small object.

So she tooled up and raced to the address.  Gwen identified the house by the presence of the SUV outside and the strangely drawn curtains.

Like Ianto, she checked out the house’s owner before entering.  As soon as she saw the lounge she stopped dead.

There was a strange blue slime everywhere except against the wall opposite where it looked like a man sized object had stood in the way.  She saw Jack’s slime covered greatcoat and the ruined, slimy remains of Ianto’s suit and Jack’s shirt and trousers.

Gwen was careful not to step in the stuff as some areas had been protected by objects in front of them.  There were patterns in the slime on the sofa that could have indicated some kind of struggle.

No bodies though.

She made her way back out of the lounge and in the hall found the evidence that confirmed her suspicion.  A trail two sets of blue footprints hurrying to the bath room.

That made sense to Gwen.  If the slime was harmful then they would go and wash it off quickly, but where were they.

Instinct made her turn towards the open bedroom door.  The smell of sex hit her before she entered and looked down at her colleagues.

They were naked and she could only say Ianto was covered as he seemed to be wrapped up by Jack.  She forced herself to turn away and not look at them.

She knew that Jack probably felt that his body was fair game to be ogled at, but Ianto wouldn’t.  Knowing that it felt forbidden made the thought of looking even more tempting.

Gwen still had to check they were alright.  Just because they’d had sex in a dead old lady’s house, didn’t mean the slime didn’t kill them afterwards.

Keeping her eyes directed to their faces she watched them breathing soundly and checked for pulses.  They just seemed to be asleep, which was odd because Jack said he didn’t sleep.

It occurred to her that sexual exhaustion might be enough to make Jack pass out.  Suddenly the signs of a struggle on the sofa became the signs of sexual passion.

It also hit her that Jack’s body was awfully close to Ianto’s.  The Welshman had to be squashing the Immortal’s family jewels unless...

 _No_ , she didn’t want to go there and suddenly Gwen felt a wave of anger.  She’d been worried sick since she realised that they hadn’t come back from the rift alert and all the time it was because they had shagged their brains out.

She was on the verge of saying something, of waking them up, when Jack made a soft noise.  Ianto shifted slightly becoming even more buried under the captain and they both resettled.

Gwen carefully lifted the abandoned sheets and gently covered them.  They shuffled closer again but remained asleep.  She waited until she was half way down the stairs before breathing out the sigh she’d been holding.

She had remembered that Jack and Ianto been having a rough time lately and only just seemed to be back on track.  She couldn’t be angry and ruin things for them now, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t tease them when they woke up.

She phoned Rhys who had the morning off and had been unhappy about the fact that Gwen had to work.  She’d given him a spare set of keys to get into the Hub in case of an emergency, she hadn’t gotten around to telling Jack yet but she was sure Ianto knew.

Gwen asked her husband to go and collect some clothes and shoes for the two men from their lockers at the Hub and bring them to this address.  When he demanded to know why she told him the truth that their current attire had been ruined by blue slime, but she made out as though it had only just happened and that she’d escaped the same fate by checking out upstairs at the time.

She had brought some equipment with her which included rubber gloves.  Despite the fact he two men appeared to be okay Gwen wasn’t going to take any chances.

The Ex-PC retrieved the SUV’s keys and got some sample kits and testing equipment out.  Gwen had finished collecting all the samples she needed and retrieved the pieces of the object that seemed to be in the centre of a wrecked coffee table.

There seemed to be a boot prints in it and she bagged Jack’s boots just in case there was anything salvageable of the alien artefact on them.  She was all finished by the time Rhys arrived.

Gwen thanked him and told him to go back to the Hub with some of the samples as they wouldn’t all fit in her car.  He grumbled but she said she would make it worth his while.

She then put the car keys in the holdall and brought it up to Jack and Ianto and was just in time to see the Welshman wake.  Gwen was certain that they would be longer than twenty minutes judging from the way the Immortal was waking.

Although she fully intended to pretend to take offence later, Gwen was actually quite pleased.  Finding her colleagues in flagrante had given her a few wicked ideas of her own and she had the perfect husband to share them with.

There was a naughty thrill in the idea of seducing Rhys on the sofa in the middle of the Hub.

Gwen made a mental note to burn the CCTV footage onto a DVD for them to watch later then erase all traces that he husband had ever been there.  She knew both Tosh and Owen had programmes for that sort of thing.

Rhys wasn’t sure at all but she reassured him that Jack and Ianto would be ages with the clean up.  She then took direct action by stripping off and challenging him not to enjoy.

He left with her knickers and delighted thoughts about the second round tonight, after dinner at Ianto’s.

Which was why she was practicing her stern face, so as not to give away the fact that she’s had as good a morning as the boys.

Ianto would expect a stern face, expect her to be disgruntled at them for what they’d done not secretly planning a night of bliss with her husband. 

She had to give him what he expected because the truth would make him uncomfortable.  Mostly because Gwen knew that Ianto would pinpoint Jack as the source of her inspiration, despite the Welshman’s own fitness and her not thinking of the Immortal that way since she’d caught them in the hot house.

The thought reminded her to get a morning after pill from the medical stores.  She would need it after she spent tonight the way she felt inspired to.

Gwen looked at the clock.  She’d had plenty of time to cover her tracks just as she’d predicted she would. 

Now if only she could get her stern face right and stop the grin Rhys had given her.


	26. Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-Six

 

One look from Gwen’s stern face had Ianto scurrying straight into the Archives.

“You know we’re not going to get any coffee today don’t you,” Jack told her without being upset.

“From what I saw this morning I didn’t think you’d have any problem getting up,” she retorted.

“And Rhys what about him.”

“What do you mean?” she replied blithely though her cheeks reddened slightly and a “been well shagged” grin spread across her face.

“I thought I might take a look at the security footage see what I’ve missed.”

“Then you’ll see me hard at it, working away here all by myself,” she replied with barely a stutter over her innuendo.

Jack chuckled and made his way to his office. He could smell sex in the Hub and considering the fact that he and Ianto had christened several areas, he wasn’t going to begrudge Gwen a little fun.

His ego enjoyed being an inspiration for others.  Ianto hadn’t said anything but he was sure they hadn’t been using any covers before he blacked out last night which meant Gwen had had a good view of his arse.

Only she hadn’t looked at him just now.  She’d looked at Ianto.

_No, she was just teasing him.  She’s never thought of Ianto that way._

Mentally Jack reconstructed their positions.  The jealousy threatening to burn through him calmed as he realised the position of their legs, the slight twist in their bodies meant she couldn’t have seen what was for his eyes only.

What she had seen was the rest of Ianto’s broad muscular body, every curve of which brought sensual delights.  Not to mention the tattoos but maybe she hadn’t noticed them.

Jack felt the little Captain stirring but forced himself to a halt.  He didn’t think either member of his team would appreciate it if he needed a private moment right now.

Today felt too glorious for paperwork.  So instead he reached for his sketchpad.  From memory he began to sketch the sight of Ianto Jones covered in slime, both fully dressed and naked.

Ianto appeared later with lunch, sandwiches and doughnuts, before disappearing back into the archives.  He didn’t reappear again until half past five.

“I found out some things about last night’s slime bomb.”

“Yes?”

“It’s a practical joke or it became one.  There have been several incidents with them and Torchwood Two actually has one that’s still intact,” Ianto began as he moved across the office towards Jack.

“There was one that sprayed dried petals which suggests that it was supposed to add something to a wedding or romantic occasion.  The ones that spew less pleasant substances are more common.

“The speculation is that they are meant to be a gift for someone you don’t like.  They look like an ornament but with the right trigger, or after a countdown, they go off and everything gets coated.”

“That explains the analysis,” Gwen said making them both jump as they hadn’t seen her follow Ianto in.

“I got the results double checked by Martha before she went off on this new assignment of hers on the continent.  She’s confirmed what our computers say. 

“There are a few alien elements but basically the slime is the same substance they cover actors in for sci-fi movies.  Non-toxic and harmless to human, just gooey and ruins our clothes.

“It is not an aphrodisiac unless one of you has a blue slime fetish and I can guess which one of you has that.  If you don’t mind I’m going to go home for an early night,” she announced and was off before either man could say anything.

“I don’t have a blue slime fetish.  It’s all about the sexy Welsh Torchwood Archivist,” Jack muttered.

“So, as long as Gwen thinks my job is boring my sex life is guaranteed,” Ianto stated as though taking a mental note.  Jack growled and Ianto smiled back.

“You told her it was an aphrodisiac?”

“It was the only thing I could think of to explain how we behaved last night and this morning.”

Jack carefully looked at Ianto to see if he meant ‘you’ instead of ‘we’.  He didn’t want the Welshman to believe that it wasn’t his sensual body but some alien slime that had finally stirred the Little Captain.

The faraway look in Ianto’s eyes told Jack that it was his own behaviour that was puzzling him far more than Jack’s.

It wasn’t as though this was the first time they had allowed passion, adrenaline or fear to drive them into the throws of sexual passion, not the first time they couldn’t wait to leave the scene of an incident before losing themselves in each other’s bodies.

Yet now Jack thought about it, last night wasn’t quite right.  While he could see himself behaving exactly as he had he couldn’t quite see Ianto doing the same thing.

Sure he could see them having sex the first time, possibly even the second but then they should have gathered up their clothes and put them in the wash while they cleaned up and then showered while they clothes dried.  They should then have dressed and continued at the Hub or Ianto’s flat.

Yet the Welshman hadn’t just eagerly followed him into the shower, he’d teased Jack and they made love in the bed afterwards. 

Then his morning, okay the first time Jack could see Ianto putting up no resistance, but his name and a glare were barely a token protest against the second time.

“It was probably just the heat of the moment.  Fifty-first century pheromones,” Ianto interrupted his thought with a shrug.

Yet as he turned away, Ianto looked into Jack eyes, and the lie he saw in them terrified the Immortal, because he felt so unworthy of such an emotion.


	27. Chapter Twenty-eight - Photographs

Jack was in a quandary.  After the Little Captain’s reawakening he wanted to paint Ianto in the nude more than ever, but he couldn’t decide what pose he wanted.

He invited Ianto to the Play Room after dinner for some intimate portrait painting and now he couldn’t decide.  He wondered if he should let the Welshman choose the pose again or go for something outrageous.

Yet when he arrived after shutting the Hub down for the night, his painting equipment was missing.  Instead there was a Welshman wearing only a robe and holding out a camera.

When Ianto turned his right arm towards Jack for his first pose the Immortal realised the Welshman wanted photographs of his tattoos.  They both knew they couldn’t be kept and felt sad about it.

Taking photographs was perfect.  Now Jack could have Ianto pose in whatever position he liked and snap, he had a picture.

He took photograph after photograph until he was so hard he had to put the camera down and make love to Ianto.  Then Jack got undressed and made love to the Welshman again.

On the third night they decided to take photographs, Jack set three cameras up at slightly different angles.  He took the photos himself at first, then used his wrist strap to program the cameras to take the photos every five seconds, one after the other.

As soon as they were automatically taking pictures of Ianto, Jack joined him.  He kissed and teased the Welshman, stripped off himself then they had passionate sex captured in stills.

Jack began to paint again but there were nights when they didn’t feel like it or it felt as though painting was to slow to capture the images he wanted, especially after their trip to CERN. 

Some nights they edited the stills of the two of them together, getting rid of the blurred images.  On those nights they would sit naked at the Play Room’s computer with Ianto on Jack’s lap.

The Welshman would control the mouse as they chose their pictures because Jack’s fingers were usually occupied with opening Ianto.  When the combination of images and those little noises his lover made became too much the Immortal would enter him and they would thrust together while images of themselves were displayed like a slide show.

It wasn’t just naked or sexual photographs that Jack took of Ianto.  The Immortal used them to prevent the Welshman from finding a suitable argument for not having his picture taken when fully dressed in public.

Ianto couldn’t understand why Jack wanted normal pictures of him but didn’t argue.  The two of them ended up seeing most of Cardiff with their camera.

They took photos of Gwen and Rhys too.  The Welshwoman made no objections until the night they were chasing an alien and Jack stood there taking pictures of Ianto as he tackled the alien single handed.

“I knew he could take it,” might have made Ianto smile and with further praise led to an ecstatic evening afterwards, but that cut no dice with Gwen who gave him a tongue lashing and banned him from taking the camera on missions.

Unfortunately that was not the only time Jack’s photography got him into trouble.  The next time was many months later and it was Ianto he was in trouble with.  That incident was so much worse, despite it not being entirely his fault.

While looking for a present for Ianto’s birthday in a bookshop, Jack spotted a photography section. 

The books of photographs triggered a memory of Gwen telling Tosh she was glad she’d decided not to have her photographer make a book of her wedding photographs because there were so few that were usable after the fake pregnancy and Nostrovite attack damage.

A week later Gwen found a book of her wedding photos on her desk, Nostrovite attack and all.  It was made of the various pictures the guests had taken that day and Torchwood confiscated and she couldn’t help being delighted.

Jack suddenly wanted a book of his photographs of Ianto.  Not their intimate photos, but the ones of the Welshman around Cardiff.

So the Immortal immediately went and found a printer willing to make a book for him.  Jack handed over his flash drive and showed him the folder with pictures he wanted in the book.

He left excited and completely forgot that his intimate photos were also on the flash drive and that the folder wasn’t password protected.  The man in charge of assembling the book couldn’t resist looking in the other folder.

As soon as he did he knew exactly what a gold mine he had.  He didn’t think he could use them for black-mail, and certainly couldn’t legally sell the photographs, but he knew exactly were to sell them on the black market and internet.

A couple of weeks later Ianto realised he was being stalked.  He lured the man into an abandoned shop, knocked him out and called for Jack.

Together they interrogated the man as quickly discovered that the stalker had nothing to do with aliens and everything to do with being a sexual predator.  They found out about the photographs and Jack realised what had happened.

They retconned the stalker and Jack told Ianto about the book.  The Immortal was confused and horrified and felt terribly guilty as the Welshman’s demeanour became colder and colder.

Ianto sent Jack back to the Hub telling him that he would take care of everything.  The Immortal wanted to protest, but the look in the Welshman’s eyes terrified him into submission, he couldn’t see a spark of love in them.

The next day it was not Ianto who was the first into the Hub, it was Martha Jones.

“Martha Jones, voice of a nightingale, what are you doing here?”

“I’m here to babysit you so you don’t get into any trouble.”

“Ianto sent you.”

“Yes and he gave me a computer program to deal with those photos on the internet.”

“How is he?”

“He was still livid when he sent me here.  He knows this wasn’t your fault, not deliberately, but he feels violated and it’s making him angry.  When he said he could’ve strangled you I think he meant it.”

“Oh Martha I can’t believe I’ve lost him.  I was trying so hard.”

“You haven’t lost him Jack.  If he didn’t still love you he wouldn’t have sent me to look after you.  He needs to sort this out though.  He’ll be back when he’s finished,” she reassured gently.

Jack didn’t ask what Ianto had done to get UNIT to agree to let them borrow Martha.  He had the sinking feeling that whatever blackmail he used this time involved the photographs.

Five days later Jack’s computer informed him that Ianto was in the Play Room.  He went there immediately half afraid of what he would find.

As he entered he heard the shower running.  Jack changed the sheets that hadn’t been touched since the last time there were here together but Ianto hadn’t finished.

Fearfully Jack entered the bathroom.  The curtains moved inviting him to join the shower’s occupant.

Jack did as he was bid but could not look up.  He just stood there as gentle hands rubbed shower gel across his body then shampooed his hair.

When finished the shower was turned off and Jack was led out to the bedroom and dried.  He didn’t look up as he was sat on the lap of the man leading him and a sealed book placed on his lap.

As it was unwrapped he suddenly knew exactly what was in the book.  He couldn’t bear to see, didn’t want to see what he ruined.

“Ianto...”

“I think I got most of them.  I know there are no traces on the internet anymore and I think I managed to get most of the hard copies and destroyed them, retconned the owners.

“I know you were only trying to make something special and it was stolen from you.  Now I’m giving it back.”

Jack felt helpless as the book was opened and the first beautiful image of Ianto was displayed.  He felt sick to know that someone else had looked at it.  Feeling the little Captain twitch made him feel worse.

He couldn’t help feeling bitter.  For so long the Little Captain wouldn’t react to the Welshman’s beauty when Jack wanted it to, and now he didn’t want to react it was hardening without permission.

He was slightly startled to feel a hand touch his cock.  As soon as he flinched he felt Ianto freeze behind him.

Jack suddenly realised that tonight had nothing to do with punishment.  He thrust gently into the hand on his cock and Ianto relaxed, stilled him, turned the page and slowly began to stroke.

The Immortal knew that when he’d been washed earlier he’d been forgiven.  His crime was stupidity but he’d been absolved of all the guilt that went with his actions.

No this wasn’t about punishment, it was about Ianto checking to see that he was still wanted.  Martha was right the Welshman had felt violated, something meant for the Immortal alone had been soiled, now he was checking that he wasn’t tainted in Jack’s eyes.

Ianto stroked Jack gently, turning the pages after giving the Immortal time to appreciate them.  Even though it had been five days, Jack let the Welshman take his time, he wanted to see every beautiful photograph.

Jack felt proud that he hadn’t come then the book was closed.  It had taken all his effort but he knew what he wanted to look at when he climaxed.

Ianto set the book aside and shifted slightly and turned Jack to that he could see the Immortal’s face.  The Welshman looked concerned, nervous, then gradually began to smile.

The look that the Immortal had been waiting for appeared in his eyes again.  The one that terrified Jack, the one he never wanted to name, never wanted to disappear.

It was a look that could make a man a hero just for giving a helping hand with the simplest of jobs.  It was the kind of look that made you wonder if there was a halo of light around you because it made you feel beautiful inside.

Under such a look Jack couldn’t help respond.  He felt warm fire rise within him wanting Ianto to see the same look in his eyes, or as close as he was capable of.

With such a rush of feeling Jack came.  Ianto nursed him through the aftershocks the leaned back for a tissue to clean him up.

Then Ianto wrapped his arms around Jack and held him close for a long time.

The next evening when the Welshman answered Jack’s call to the Play Room it was to find a naked immortal with a camera.  This time it was Ianto who took the pictures, some silly, some serious, some with the salvaged greatcoat.

Like the Immortal, there was only so many the Welshman could take before he wanted to make love to Jack.  As before after the third night there were three cameras set to take automatic pictures of the pair of them.

Two weeks later, after a hard day, Jack took Ianto home and they took a bath together.  The Immortal then dried the Welshman down and sat him on the bed, in his lap and produced a book.

This time the book was full of photographs of Jack.  The Immortal gently stroked Ianto and had to restrain himself from reacting to the Welshman’s soft moans.

Like with Jack, Ianto reached the end of the book and looked into the Immortal’s face before coming.  After cleaning him up he held the Welshman until he fell asleep.

 

When the Immortal said his final farewell to Ianto, he laid the book of photographs of Jack beside him.  He wanted that part of himself to be something that was the Welshman’s alone, before he painted the ‘ _Guardian Angel_ ’ and pour out his grief.

For a long time afterwards Jack was determined not to fall in love.  Ianto had left an image of perfection in his mind that he avoided whenever he could.

That didn’t mean he didn’t have occasional flings.  He was human and had needs but he never let anyone become close.  Some understood that, some didn’t care and some resented it.

So it came as a surprise to Jack to suddenly feel the fear again.  The fear that came when the friend he occasionally slept with was in danger, and he realised she meant more to him than just a friend with benefits.

As soon as she was out of danger the flood of emotion he felt told him he was falling in love again.  As soon as he realised that Jack ran.

He didn’t know where he was going and he didn’t care.  It didn’t matter that every step was a knife wound of pain throughout his being, he had to leave now, he couldn’t go through the pain he had felt for Ianto’s loss again.

When Jack finally stopped he had no idea where he was.

So the last thing he expected was courier.

The letter had no name but the courier scanned his thumb print and iris to confirm the envelope was for him.  Intrigued Jack opened it straight away.

 

Dear Sir,

 

I have a mission of great importance for you.  There is someone I need you to locate and protect.  You may find him irritating, may want to kill him sometimes but you must protect him.  His safety is vital to the fate of the universe. 

Please see the enclosed for details of this man’s identity.

 

At the bottom was the seal of the King of Great Britain, a man he had met and respected very much so there was no need to wonder at the resources that tracked him down. 

He opened the second envelope wanting something to distract him from his broken heart.

Inside there was a picture of himself, and another and another.  In some of the pictures he was fully dress, in some he was naked or almost naked.  In all of them he was smiling.

He knew Ianto had taken these pictures before he came across the first one of the Welshman.

Ianto was wearing his sexiest suit, the one that always guaranteed him a night of sexual bliss.  In his hand the Welshman was holding a sign that said “Be Happy”.

In the second photograph Ianto was wearing the suit Jack bought him as an apology when he returned from the year that never was.  The sign he was holding this time said “Find Love”.

In the final photograph Ianto was naked, his virtue protected only by the third sign which read “The Universe Awaits”.

The stab of pain the first photograph elicited became a flood of affection and love by the time he read the third message.  It banished the fear in Jack’s heart and he realised he was an idiot who may have just ruined everything.

Jack stuffed the envelope and letter into his pocket and began to run.  He didn’t stop until he found the lover he’d abandoned.

When he saw her she was reading a letter.  As she saw him she stuffed it in her pocket and began to shout at him.

Jack let the tirade of anger flood over him.  He led her gently to a seat and knelt before her. 

When she stopped shouting he asked her to marry him.  Her hand touched her pocket as she called him a crazy mad bastard.  Then she said yes and spent the rest of her life making him almost as happy as Ianto had.

 

 

 

 


	28. Chapter Twenty-nine - The Ambassador for Wales

Jack always had mixed feelings about the Team’s trip to Switzerland.  Sure he would help Martha again in a heartbeat, he would do what he could to save the world but the trip had stirred up things best left quiet.

Even though Ianto had been making it perfectly clear that he was part of the team, a field agent of as much worth as Gwen, Jack hated putting him in danger.  All through Martha’s medical examination of the Welshman, he waited outside and began to run through all the reasons he could think of to shut his lover away in the Hub again.

Jack had done the right thing dividing their forces, he’d made the right choice stopping the collider from the control room, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t hate it.  Ianto’s reassuring smile, the poem he spoke to comfort Martha weren’t enough.

So they had headed for the airport as soon and they were sure Martha didn’t need them anymore.  Jack didn’t stop feeling tense until the plane took off and they were on their way to Cardiff.

Normally the Torchwood team flew economy but a rumour had begun, probably put about by the UNIT doctor, that the Ambassador for Wales was aboard and they all got upgraded to first class.

The seats were spacious, the in-flight entertainment looked good too, but Jack felt a little restless.  Adrenaline and fear were still mixed in his system and he needed a special kind of reassurance.

“Hey Ianto fancy joining the mile...” he turned to his young lover and saw that he was asleep.

A strong wave of affection flooded Jack as he looked at his sleeping lover.  He couldn’t disturb him despite the strong need he felt.

He was glad he hadn’t seen Ianto with a golden glow.  Sure he would have looked angelic but he always looked angelic.

He had nearly lost Ianto again and the thought terrified him.  All while he had dealt with the collider, there was a part of him that wished he could tear through the layers of rock between him and the Welshman to save him.

Watching him gently sleep, a slight bit of drool coming out of the corner of his mouth, Jack felt a dopey, relieved, affection calming him.

Careful not to disturb his lover Jack reached for Ianto’s hand luggage.  Carefully he extracted the sketch pad and a pencil he knew would be there and began to draw.

“He looks so peaceful when he’s asleep,” Gwen said quietly making Jack jump.  Only quick reflexes prevented the almost completed sketch from having a line through it.

“You missed the er...” she added mischievously indicating the drool.

“Gwen earlier when... did he look...”

“No Jack he didn’t,” she replied vehemently.  She hesitated then said.

“He was like he was the night Lisa died, when we dragged him onto the invisible lift.  He was wild and half mad but not angry like he was then.

“It was like they had taken part of him and were calling to him for the rest.  He wanted to go, to join them like he felt that was where he belonged.

“When you stopped them, he didn’t just stop glowing it was like the strings were cut.  The control they had over him was gone and he doesn’t remember,” she said gently rubbing his shoulder as Jack tried not to let the tears in his eyes fall.

When they got back, the turbulent emotions the CERN incident had stirred in Jack were still in control.  The Immortal knew had to have a portrait of his sleeping angel.

Jack knew just how to wear Ianto out with work then talk him into sleeping so that he could be painted.  The Welshman of course made sure the Immortal had less opportunities than he wanted to paint him asleep, indulging the artist strictly on his terms.

As soon as Gwen saw it at the grand unveiling she said, “If it isn’t the Ambassador for Wales.”  Any other name for the portrait of Ianto asleep serendipitously vanished from Jack’s mind.

Perhaps it was because the name stuck that on the next suitable occasion when they went aboard, Ianto used his identity as the Ambassador for Wales, his wife and assistant for cover.

As soon as the three of them were alone in the great hall full of guests after being announced, Jack took the opportunity to complain.  He even asked why the Ambassador couldn’t have a husband instead.

“Jack there are three reasons why I chose this cover.  Firstly I chose Gwen for my wife because Ambassadors tend to marry natives of their own country so as not to be biased in their representation.  I have heard your Welsh accent Jack it’s atrocious and I wouldn’t inflict it on anyone.

“Secondly, while stealth is more my mien and being the centre of attention yours, this mission requires us to divide our forces between this room and the rest of the buildings.  I am much better at watching and listening unobserved, and much better at diplomacy than you are.

“You however as my assistant will soon be dismissed, giving you free reign to explore and use your considerable charm while investigating everywhere else.  As my wife Gwen can move from checking out the guests to slipping out and following anyone she thinks is suspicious while attention is on me.”

“And the third reason?” Jack asked determined not to see Ianto excellent points as good reasons.

“The third is that like most of the assistants here, you have a higher probability of ending the night in bed with the Ambassador than the wife does.”

“That’s charming that is, we’ve hardly been married for five minutes and already you’re shagging your secretary,” Gwen said in mock complaint.

“I don’t see why you’re complaining you’re having as affair with the housekeeper and this is the key to his room at the local hotel that you’ve arranged for him,” Ianto replied surreptitiously handing it over.

“You didn’t?” she asked her eyes sparkling.

Ianto merely smiled.  Impulsively she kissed him and then hurried away to chat up some dignitaries and find out if they were aliens in disguise.

“When we’ve finished I’m going to screw you so hard you’re going to forget she even exists,” Jack growled and Ianto turned to him.

“No Jack, I’m the Ambassador.  I’m the one who gets to screw you so hard you will forget you are even capable of feeling jealousy.  Now go and save the world while I dazzle with dignity.”

Ianto kept his promise but he also dazzled too well.  His quiet polite charm worked its magic on an alien princess barely out of her species adolescence.

When she returned to her planet her admiration and adoration for the Ambassador for Wales was overheard by the wrong person and it almost lead to war.

Two alien fleets headed for earth to demand that the Ambassador for Wales be handed over to them for satisfaction.  The government had no idea what they were talking about and it took all Jack’s efforts to restrain Ianto to prevent him from surrendering himself.

“If they want the Ambassador for Wales they can bloody well have him,” Gwen said.

Before either man could protest Gwen marched into Jack’s office but instead of grabbing Ianto, she grabbed the portrait of him asleep.  She went out to face the battle fleets and handed it over.

Between Gwen and the Princess the two alien commanders became convinced that it was the portrait that the Princess had spoken of not a person.  The Aliens took the portrait and apologised for the misunderstanding.

It was over one and a half thousand years later before Jack had the opportunity of seeing ‘ _The Ambassador for Wales_ ’ in an alien museum.  He couldn’t believe the number of visitors he watched look at it, on a par with the ‘ _Mona Lisa_ ’.

The warm feeling Jack had as he left that museum had nothing to do with artistic pride.  It was a joy to see Ianto getting the worship he deserved.


	29. Chapter Twenty-nine - Captive Beauty

Ianto Jones knew full well that the CERN incident had been a setback in Jack’s recovery from the losses of Owen and Tosh.  He knew because it was a setback in his own recovery.

He had spoken the truth when he said he didn’t remember anything from the moment of the attack to waking up with Gwen and Martha hovering over him.  Yet he remembered the voices, remembered the temptations they called to him and knew the hesitation they caused were the reason he was caught.

It surprised Ianto how much the memory of Tosh still left an ache in his heart, more so than using Lisa’s name, but he’d already been fooled that way once.

Tosh though wouldn’t have wanted him stay behind while the others were in danger.  She would have been right in the action and she would have wanted Ianto in the action too.

Ianto had no such ally in Gwen.

The Welshwoman had become as protective of him as Jack, she too had been tempted by the voices, but she had Ianto to look after, to keep her from listening.  For two days after they returned from Switzerland, she helped the Captain keep him in the Hub and worked long hours to be with them.

Ianto though wasn’t going to let them have their way this time.  He’d worked too hard helping both of them to let them get overprotective on him now.

The Welshman had known Jack was having difficulties choosing a pose for him to be painted in the nude; it was why he decided to let him loose with a camera.  Ianto was going to use a painting to get a message across to the Immortal and he had the perfect co-conspirator, Rhys Williams.

Gwen’s husband was feeling a little neglected and jealous after they returned to Switzerland.  He had been there for his wife so much since Gray’s attack, and now it felt to him like he was being shut out until Ianto told him what happened.

The two Welshmen were lucky that the Rift was entering a calm period, perfect for their plans to keep a firm hold of their partners.

So on the third day back from Switzerland, Rhys faked a domestic emergency to get Gwen to come home for a romantic candlelit dinner.  Ianto meanwhile summoned Jack to the Play Room.

As soon as the Immortal entered he just stared.  Ianto was sat up on the bed with his wrists handcuffed above him, his legs open, cock hard and he was wearing a black dog collar studded with diamonds that had a silver fob that said ‘Panther’.

Jack had given Ianto the collar as a New Years present after having forgotten to give him anything for their first Christmas.  It was the collar the Welshman wore as a warning that he was bringing out his wild side.

The Immortal took a step towards him feeling the Little Captain stir instantly.  The Welshman growled causing Jack to pause mid-step.

Ianto’s eyes flickered to where the easel was set up ready for Jack to paint.  He tried to step closer again and a second growl confirmed it, painting first then wildcat sex.

‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’ would prove to be the most difficult painting for Jack to paint.  It would take the longest and be humbling as it showed the Immortal that his stamina was not what it used to be.

It was so hard to concentrate on doing justice to Ianto when his cock ached with arousal.  The situation was made worse by the fact that he’d been tricking the Welshman into sleep, instead of attending to the sexual needs the trip to Switzerland stirred.

Jack lasted just over an hour before he couldn’t take the sight before him anymore, Ianto’s smouldering eyes daring him to do something.  He suspected that the Welshman was in a similar condition, especially as he had the visual evidence, and decided to release him.

As soon as his hand slipped from the last bracelet Ianto pounced.  Jack found himself on his back being kissed while his braces, belt, buttons and flies were all being opened.

He was so taken off guard that he didn’t notice his hands being restrained by his own belt.  Not until Ianto’s attention left his torso for his groin.

Ianto opened his flies and dragged down his trousers just enough to expose his cock.  The Welshman’s mouth did wicked things and too soon Jack was coming.

The afterglow barely faded and Jack found himself being turned on his stomach.  He was naked from the waist down and a ripping sound confirmed that his back was now bare too.

Ianto kissed, sucked and lightly scratched his back, attending it from shoulder to arse.  Jack felt his cheeks part and something warm and wet danced around his entrance.

It took him a few minutes to realise it was the Welshman's tongue.  Instantly the Little Captain started to show interest again.

Soon the tongue was joined then replaced by saliva slicked fingers.  Jack moaned loudly with pleasure as Ianto finished opening him and pushed something much better inside. 

The Welshman reached beneath Jack and took charge of his cock.  Ianto thrust hard and fast and the Immortal spurred him on until they both came in a sudden rush.

Ianto reached up to undo the belt that restrained the Immortal’s hands but beyond that made no move to get off of him.  The way the Welshman was playing with his left nipple told Jack that they had only just finished round one.

The next day Ianto walked around the Hub with the smug air of a cat who got the cream.  Between the memories and the Welshman’s provocative teasing, all Jack could think about was going back to the Play Room and continuing from last night.

Gwen had obviously had just a good a night as they had because she raised no objection to going home early.  In fact she raced out with a huge smile on her face and without saying bye to Ianto.

Jack summoned the Archivist to his office and handed him the black dog collar.  Ianto did a few things with his PDA then put it down, stripped off all his clothes then took the collar and put it on.

The Immortal couldn’t remember getting to the Play Room.  Jack just couldn’t let that magnificent arse out of his sight and the next thing he knew it had become a cock and Ianto was waiting for him.

The Welshman positioned himself on the bed and Jack cuffed him.  He then couldn’t resist teasing Ianto’s body before licking the prize.

The noises Ianto made always drove him wild.  As a wildcat, the Welshman never restrained himself, he just let his whole being shout out his pleasure.

Jack unzipped his trousers and got himself out.  He stroked a hard rhythm along his shaft guaranteed to make him come quickly.

As soon as he did, he let Ianto’s fabulous cock slip from his mouth.  The Welshman growled but Jack just tucked himself away.

He then went to the easel and began to paint again.  It was much easier to do the painting post-orgasm even if the sight was already stirring him again.

When he couldn’t take his hard on anymore, he stripped and released the Welshman.  Jack was pounced on again but tonight his preparations had included a butt plug, wildcat Ianto had some pleasant objections to him using a butt plug.

For the second night in a row Jack was orgasmed into unconsciousness by fantastic sex.  In the morning he was still not forgiven for the butt plug.

Jack was awakened by pleasant sensations to his cock and the mild panic that he couldn’t move his arms.  Ianto was responsible for both conditions as he realised he was restrained by his belt and receiving a fantastic blow job.

Just as he was on the edge though Ianto withdrew and stood.  He was wearing a suit and Jack watched him hide the black dog collar behind the shirt and tie.

“Wait there just as you are.  I suddenly fancy some coffee and Danishes to go with my cream.”

Jack was still hard an hour later when Ianto returned without his suit.  The Welshman fed him his coffee and Danish before finishing the blow job.

The butt plug was still up the Immortal’s arse so Ianto was quite free to enter Jack and pound him back into a sexual bliss induced sleep.

When he re-awoke Ianto was curled up asleep beside him.  Careful not to disturb him, Jack removed the dog collar and hid it.

When Ianto woke they showered, dressed and went out with the camera.  They did some sightseeing, had lunch, more sightseeing, then dinner before spending several hours curled up on the Welshman’s sofa watching telly.

That night Jack made gently love to Ianto and it wasn’t until the next morning that the Immortal remembered Torchwood.

The huge smile on Gwen’s face told him that she’d also had a pleasant day off.  It also told him that Ianto had purposefully arranged the whole thing.

It was then that he realised the message behind ‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’.  Sinfully erotic as the site of the bound and hard wildcat was, it was nothing to the power and passion when he was released, not just in his collared role, but as Ianto Jones himself.

Jack never banished Ianto to the Hub except when the mission required it.  Together they painted several more erotic pieces.

The Immortal only worked on ‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’ when either he or Ianto needed to forget about Torchwood for a while.  When they needed passion and each other’s bodies the most.

By the time it was finished the Captive had only two dragon tattoos, the one on the right hip which Jack had painted first and the one of the left inner thigh that Ianto had removed last.

Instead of handcuffs the captive was bound with bands of red silk and random patterns of love bites reddening his skin.  The details on the hard cock were exquisite down to the drops of pre-come.

Jack had to keep it hidden behind a curtain because he felt hard every time he looked at it.  Ianto could always tell when he had been looking because it gave the Immortal an edge in their love making.

‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’ would be the most infamous of the paintings stolen from Jack.  Where with the other paintings he heard nothing for centuries, with ‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’ he heard over a hundred rumours.

It seemed like everyone in the art word knew about the painting and everyone rich with an interest in art did too.  What surprised Jack was that it wasn’t just desired by gay men, straight women and bisexuals, straight men were also aroused by it as they imagined themselves in the Captive’s place.

It was the most duplicated and copied of all Jack’s paintings.  Not just amongst humans but by some alien races as well.

Jack visited a few bordellos in the line of duty and seen replications in the main entrance, only a few of them wore Ianto’s face.

Like the photographs, each rumour, each copy made Jack feel like a piece of Ianto was being stolen from him.  He felt ashamed that he hadn’t been able to protect the Welshman’s privacy.

Then, during the fifty-fifth century, he was feeling nostalgic.  He wanted to walk the paths of his youth and felt safe to do so now he could no longer cause a paradox.

He was tracing his military career after the loss of his best friend to the creatures that killed his father and took Gray.  It was the most painful part of this journey but he felt ready to face it now and move on.

Jack then followed the path of his rescuers.  They travelled to a few planets as they looked after him, taught him what they knew.

His journey lead him to a deserted world, one where the people didn’t survive the war and its aftermath.  There he found the big house around which his regiment had been stationed and entered.

Most of the house meant nothing to him.  There was the kitchens of course, the grand hall and a room full of equipment that was used for senior staff briefings.

Jack’s legs drew him upstairs.  He remembered feeling curious and wanting to see where rich people had lived.

The Immortal opened the door to the master bedroom.  And there was ‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’, not a copy, the original.

Jack remembered seeing it all those millennia ago, remembered being as spellbound by it then as he was now, and wondered why he’d forgotten it.

Then he remembered, he had been caught almost immediately after seeing it by the two senior officers who had been looking after him, and the sexual tension that had been building between the three of them suddenly needed release.

He’s lost both his virginities in this room that night, a threesome with a man and woman.  Jack remembered telling Ianto about that night, remembered wishing he was there so that he could have given the Welshman his virginity, and in a way he had been there.

In that instant Jack remembered Ianto’s subtle message.  That the Captive was attractive but so much more beautiful when set free.

He and Ianto’s need for privacy had been this painting’s prison and all along as he searched it had been glorious in its freedom.

When Jack took it home he kept it behind a curtain again, partly to hide it from young eyes and partly because it still made him hard every time he looked at it.

Yet if anyone wanted to see it, Jack showed them ‘ _Captive Beauty_ ’ and watched the gazer blossom.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you have enjoyed this story but this isn't quite the end. As I mentioned, the events in the Epilogue to both Company of a Stranger and Company of a Ghost occur next chronologically and they are connected to the events in the next chapter of this story. If you want to read the Epilogue of Company of a Stranger and Ghost then select the link to the next story in the Awaiting Universe. However if you just want to read the end of this story select the link for the next part of Artistic Company.


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